Zika Virus or Roundup Herbicide The Cause of Microcephaly?
Zika Virus or Glyphosate Exposure Causing Microcephaly

Originally published on jeffreydachmd.com.

What's causing microcephaly? It might not be what the media is telling you...

Is It Zika Virus or Glyphosate Exposure ?

The news media has been reporting the Zika virus as the cause of microcephaly. The story originated in a Monsanto chemical industry press release dated Feb 17, 2016 which was then copied over the news media. The Zika virus was discovered in Uganda in 1947, and there have been no reports of microcephaly in Uganda. A US news article says, according to Associated Press journalists who visited the Zika Forest in Uganda on Feb 1, 2016, local officials have no concern about the Zika virus.(24)

New England Journal Reports

A recent study published in the New England Journal of Medicine reported Zika Virus surveillance in Colombia.(80-81) Of 50 babies reported with microcephaly, only four (8 %) had laboratory evidence of congenital Zika virus infection on RT-PCR. The other 46 cases (92 %) were due to other causes.

Of 1850 pregnant women reported infected with Zika virus, no babies were born with microcephaly. The authors state: (80-81)

“maternal infection with the Zika virus during the third trimester of pregnancy is not linked to structural abnormalities in the fetus.”

Since 92% of microcephaly babies are not caused by maternal Zika virus, perhaps we should be looking for other preventable causes.

Dr Yaneer Bar-Yam reviewed this same data from the Colombia surveillance study After reviewing this data, Dr Yaneer Bar-Yam concluded in his own report entitled: “Is Zika the cause of Microcephaly?”that there is no direct link between zika virus and microcephaly, and he proposed pesticide exposure (pyriproxyfen) in the drinking water as an alternative explanation(99):

“This (data) would seem to rule out Zika as a cause of microcephaly. This gives a consistent interpretation that there is no direct link between Zika and microcephaly except for random co-occurrence.”….”An alternative cause of microcephaly in Brazil could be the pesticide pyriproxyfen, which is cross-reactive with retinoic acid, which causes microcephaly, and is being used in drinking water.”(99)

Dr Tiago Baptista Questions Zika as Sole Cause of Microcephaly

Maternal viral infection with rubella or cytomegalovirus have been known to cause fetal malformation and fetal demise. There is no doubt that viral illness during pregnancy is best avoided.(47-55) However, Dr Tiago Baptista in a 2016 BMJ article questions “whether the surge in reported cases of microcephaly is entirely due to Zika virus infection“(55) He says:

“The risk of microcephaly after maternal infection is estimated at roughly one in 100 women… This is a relatively low risk compared with other causal infections such as cytomegalovirus.”(55)

A Distraction From the Real Cause- Exposure to Glyphosate Causes Microcephaly and other Congenital Anomalies

I suggest that the Zika virus is merely a distraction away from the real cause, agrichemical exposure from Monsanto’s Round-Up Herbicide, glyphosate, (1-4)

Dr Alejandra Paganelli reported in 2010 that “Glyphosate-based herbicides produce teratogenic effects on vertebrates by impairing retinoic acid signaling.” (8)

Dr Paganelli concludes: “(congenital malformations) “produced by Glyphosate Based Herbicides are mainly a consequence of the increase of endogenous retinoid activity. ” (8)

Dr Sylvia Lopez

In 2012, Dr Silvia L. Lopez reviewed the effects of agricultural chemicals, glyphosate based herbicides, in human and animal models.(9) She says:

“It is very well known that acute or chronic increase of retinoic acid (RA) levels leads to teratogenic effects during human pregnancy and in experimental models. The characteristic features displayed by Retinoic Acid embryopathy in humans include brain abnormalities such as microcephaly, microphtalmia, and impairment of hindbrain development; abnormal external and middle ears (microtia or anotia), mandibular and midfacial underdevelopment, and cleft palate.” (9) Note: Retinoic Acid is Vitamin A Derivative.

Dr Benitez-Leite

Dr Benitez-Leite reported 52 cases of malformations in babies born of women exposed to agricultural chemicals. The congenital malformations observed include anencephaly, microcephaly, facial defects, myelomeningocele, cleft palate, ear malformations, polydactily, syndactily all consistent with the well-known and expected syndrome caused by upregulation of the Retinoic Acid pathway.(10) Left image Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide contains glyphosate.

Upregulation of Retinoic Acid Pathway

A number of reports have linked arial spraying with the mosquito larvicide pyriproxyfen to birth defects such as microcephaly in the crop sprayed towns of Northeast Brazil.(106-108) Pyriproxyfen disrupts retinoic acid (vitramin A) signalling, a known mechanism for microcephaly (106-108) In 1995, Dr Kenneth Rothman reported in NEJM that High Vitamin A Intake causes birth defects. (109)

Increasing Anencephaly in Yakima Valley in Washington State

Another mechanism is glyphosate disruption of folate metabolsm as discussed below in the Yakima Washington State case. (35-37)

Over three years from 2010 to 2013, the Washington State Department of Health reported an unusual increase in anencephalic babies born in Yakima, Benton and Franklin counties, four times higher than the national average. (33-34)

Anencephaply, microcephaly and spina bifida are all related disorders of neural tube closure associated with maternal folate deficiency. Maternal folate supplementation is preventive. Maternal folate supplementation in Yakima was not at issue, as this was similar to the national average. Barbara Peterson, in Farm Wars, makes a compelling case for glyphosate exposure as the cause, since the Yakima river running through the affected counties had been heavily treated with glyphosate for weed control during that time period.(29) Left image Yakima River Washington State.

Glyphosate Disrupts Folate Metabolism

Glyphosate disruption of folate metabolism is discussed by Stephanie Seneff in her May 2016 article on Weston Price.(35) Glyphosate acts as an antibiotic, killing friendly bacteria by blocking the Shikimate pathway. These friendly bacterial are also involved in bacterial conversion of folic acid to methyl folate, its active form. Maternal methylfolate deficiency is associated with neural tube defects in the developing embryo.(85-87)

Glyphosate Disrupts Glycine Metabolism

Stephanie Seneff’s article then discusses how glyphosate disrupts glycine decarboxylase metabolism, known to cause neural tube defects in animal studies and humans.(36-37)

Glyphosate is the amino acid glycine with an added phosphate group, so glyphosate may readily displace glycine in various biochemical reactions. Glyphosate disrupts glycine decarboxylase by displacing glycine as a substrate. In addition, glyphosate replaces glycine at insertion sites in amino acid chains during protein synthesis, producing defective enzymes (35). Glyphosate is basically the amino acid, glycine with a phosphate group added on to it.

Glyphosate is a Patented Antimicrobial, Anti-Folate Drug

Glyphosate is actually patented as an anti-microbial drug. (83,84) Glyphosate serves as an anti-folate agent working in synergy with other anti-folate drugs.(58,61) Other anti-folate drugs in common use include the urinary tract antibiotic, Bactrim (trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole) the rheumatology drug, methotrexate, and the anti-seizure drug Dilantin (phentoin). Maternal exposure to anti-folate drugs such as methotrexate Bactrim and Dilantin increase risk of neural tube defects in the fetus up to six-fold. (85-87) Maternal folate supplementation has been shown to reduce incidence of fetal neural tube defects (NTD), and folic acid fortification in food supply was mandated in 1998. (85-87)(100-103)

Glyphosate Inhibits the Shikimate Pathway

Glyphosate’s known mode of action is inhibition of the shikimate pathway in plants, fungi, bacteria and parasites.(58) Glyphosate blocks the pathway which produces Folate, Ubiquinone (Co-Q10), Vitamin K, and the aromatic amino acids tryptophan, phenylalanine, and tyrosine.

Government Regulators Deemed Glyphosate Safe for Humans

Government regulators deemed glyphosate safe for us humans because we lack the shikimate pathway. They forgot to consider that we humans depend on the shikimate pathway in plants and gut bacteria for our folate (vitamin B9), to prevents neural tube defects. If your lunch salad comes from an agricultural field treated with glyphosate which blocks the plant’s ability to synthesize folate, how much folate are you getting in your meal ? If you are ingesting glyphosate in your food, blocking your gut bacteria from synthesing folate, how soon will you be rendered folate deficient? Dr Bekaert says in 2008,

“Humans cannot synthesize folates (vitamin B9) and thus have to rely on plant food supplying these essential vitamins.“(104)

Dr Craig Roberts suggests that Glyphosate may serve as anti-folate, anti-parasitic drug ,He says:(58)

” it is likely that the shikimate pathway is important for supply of folate precursors in this parasite….inhibitors of EPSP synthase (such as glyphosate) can act in synergy with conventional antifolates and may be a useful addition to the agents used against apicomplexan parasites.”(58)

A quote from a University of Chicago Press Release 1998 (61) explains that Glyphosate blocks production of folate:

“Effective new ways to inhibit parasites that cause malaria, toxoplasmosis and cryptosporidiosis” June 25, 1998.(61)

“Dr. McLeod’s team showed that glyphosate, …could block the production of folate, inhibiting parasite growth and survival. Glyphosate proved effective against malaria strains that were resistant to an anti-malarial medicine, pyrimethamine, which interrupts folate processing at a different point. To confirm the finding, they demonstrated that these folate-starved parasites could be rescued, in the test tube, by giving them folate.”(61)

Brazil Annual Pesticide Sales Surpasses the US

Left Image courtesy of Reuters. Brazil sales of herbicide (glyphosate) exceeds that of US.(81)

According to Paulo Prada in her 2015 article, Brazil has a huge appetite for pesticides and herbicides, surpassing annual sales in the US.(81)

Poalo Prado explains that in Northeast Brazil, irrigation canals were built, transforming previously arid land into fertile farm land. These open air irrigation canals are heavily contaminated with herbicides and pesticides liberally applied to the crop fields. Life is primitive for the agricultural workers who live without piped in water for their dwellings. The local workers use the open air irrigation canals for their drinking water, thus are heavily exposed to herbicide and pesticide runoff.

House Passes 1.1 Billion Zika Virus Bill. Methyl-Folate is Cheaper.

Instead of spending 1.1 Billion dollars on a “controversial” Zika Virus Bill, I have a better idea for prevention of microcephaly and neural tube defects. (90) Suppose we instead allocate 100 million dollars to give out free methyl-folate tablets to all pregnant women exposed to glyphosate here in the US, and in Brazil. That would solve the problem at a fraction of the cost, saving a Billion Dollars.(90)

53 Countries Have Mandatory Flour Fortification with Folate

Folate fortification of flour for prevention of neural tube defects (anencephaly, microcephaly, spina bifida etc.) is mandated in 53 countries. Fortification of flour with folic acid was mandated in the US in 1998, the most successful public health measure in history, with reduction of neural tube defects by 36%.(100-103) In 2009, Dr Oakley declared this success story a “modern miracle of epidemiology”.(103)

Study Blood Folate Levels in North East Brazil

Why not allocate research funds to study blood folate levels in women in Northeast Brazil at high risk for having babies with neural tube defects? This was done here in the US before and after starting folate fortification in 1998, showing reduction incidence of neural tube defects by 36%.(101) Folate deficiency (blood folate levels less than 3 ng/ml)) decreased from 21% to less than 1% of the population. (101)

In Australia, mandatory fortification of bread with folate and iodine was introduced in 2009, resulting in a 50-80 per cent reduction in neural tube defects in at-risk indigenous women and teenagers.(100-112)

Reducing Microcephaly in Brazil with Folate Fortification

Studies done in Brazil shows folate deficiency is severe, affecting 94% among the poor.(113) Folate fortification of flour in three south American countries (Brazil, Argentina, Chile) resulted in significant reduction in 52 different fetal anomalies including reduction in microcephaly and anencephaly.(114) Currently all South American countries except Venezuala have mandatory folate fortification legislation.(115) In populations using folate fortification there have been decreases in neural tube defects from 30-50%.(115)

How is Such an Error Possible ?

You might ask the obvious question, “how is such an error in thinking possible” that the government would waste a billion dollars on Zika instead of Folate Fortification? This is called CrimeStop or “Protective Stupidity“, aptly described in 1984 by George Orwell (91):

“The mind should develop a blind spot whenever a dangerous thought presented itself….Crimestop, they called it in Newspeak….the Party says the earth is flat’, ‘the party says that ice is heavier than water’—and trained himself in not seeing or not understanding the arguments that contradicted them.”

“Crimestop means the faculty of stopping short, as though by instinct, at the threshold of any dangerous thought. It includes the power of not grasping analogies, of failing to perceive logical errors, of misunderstanding the simplest arguments…”…”Crimestop, in short, means protective stupidity.”(91)

Using Fear and Smear Tactics to Distract Attention from Monsanto

This article in the Huffington Post Feb 16 is typical of the Monsanto tactics to distract attention away from Roundup glyphosate as the cause of the birth defects in agricultural workers in Brazil; A Viral Story Links The Zika Crisis To Monsanto. Don’t Believe It. by Anna Almendrala Senior Healthy Living Editor Huffington Post. Anna’s piece is pure Monsanto propaganda masquerading as journalism, don’t believe a word of it. If you trust anything Monsanto says, then I have a bridge to sell you.

Monsanto has known for decades that Glyphosate causes birth defects, see this report: Roundup and birth defects. Is the public being kept in the dark ? by Michael Antoniou Earth Open Source June 2011

Search Google Scholar for articles with key words “microcephaly pesticide“ : you will see 2160 articles pop up.

Glyphosate is “Probably Carcinogenic to Humans”

A number of studies show glyphosate exposure doubles the incidence of Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma.(92) As reported in Lancet Oncology by Dr Kathryn Guyton, on March, 2015, 17 experts from 11 countries met in Lyon France and classified glyphosate as “probably carcinogenic to humans” (89)

Zika Distraction from Glyphosate – The Elephant in the Room

Certainly, maternal viral illness with Rubella, (CMV) cytomegalovirus and Zika are all risk factors for fetal demise, and fetal malformations, and are best avoided.(93-95) However, the Zika Virus is a distraction from the real cause of the problem, massive glyphosate exposure to pregnant agricultural workers in Brazil. Glyphosate is a patented anti-folate drug, Anti-folate drugs are known to cause microcephaly and neural tube defects in animals and humans.

Professor Don Huber, GMO Food and Glyphosate

Increased incidence of birth defects in the population caused by exposure to the anti-folate agent, glyphosate is only the “tip of the iceberg”. The adverse health consequences of GMO food and glyphosate contamination of our food and water supply are much more extensive as outlined in a series of articles posted on the Stephanie Seneff home page. Here is a quote from Professor Don M. Huber:(88) from his document GMO Failed Promises Flawed Science Serious Health Safety Issue

” Future historians may well look back upon our time and write, not about how many pounds of pesticides we did or did not apply, but about how willing we are to sacrifice our children and jeopardize future generations for this massive experiment we call genetic engineering that is based on failed promises and flawed science, just to benefit the bottom line of a commercial enterprise.” Dr. Don M. Huber

Link to this article: http://wp.me/p3gFbV-3En

Jeffrey Dach MD
7450 Griffin Road Suite 190
Davie, Fl 33314
954-792-4663

Articles with related interest:

Dont Ask for HIV Test Ask For Glyphosate Test

Curing Autism with Antibiotics

Berberine Antdote for an Epidemic

References

For references, please view original publication.

Zika Virus or Roundup Herbicide The Cause of Microcephaly?
Zika Virus or Glyphosate Exposure Causing Microcephaly

Originally published on jeffreydachmd.com.

What's causing microcephaly? It might not be what the media is telling you...

Is It Zika Virus or Glyphosate Exposure ?

The news media has been reporting the Zika virus as the cause of microcephaly. The story originated in a Monsanto chemical industry press release dated Feb 17, 2016 which was then copied over the news media. The Zika virus was discovered in Uganda in 1947, and there have been no reports of microcephaly in Uganda. A US news article says, according to Associated Press journalists who visited the Zika Forest in Uganda on Feb 1, 2016, local officials have no concern about the Zika virus.(24)

New England Journal Reports

A recent study published in the New England Journal of Medicine reported Zika Virus surveillance in Colombia.(80-81) Of 50 babies reported with microcephaly, only four (8 %) had laboratory evidence of congenital Zika virus infection on RT-PCR. The other 46 cases (92 %) were due to other causes.

Of 1850 pregnant women reported infected with Zika virus, no babies were born with microcephaly. The authors state: (80-81)

“maternal infection with the Zika virus during the third trimester of pregnancy is not linked to structural abnormalities in the fetus.”

Since 92% of microcephaly babies are not caused by maternal Zika virus, perhaps we should be looking for other preventable causes.

Dr Yaneer Bar-Yam reviewed this same data from the Colombia surveillance study After reviewing this data, Dr Yaneer Bar-Yam concluded in his own report entitled: “Is Zika the cause of Microcephaly?”that there is no direct link between zika virus and microcephaly, and he proposed pesticide exposure (pyriproxyfen) in the drinking water as an alternative explanation(99):

“This (data) would seem to rule out Zika as a cause of microcephaly. This gives a consistent interpretation that there is no direct link between Zika and microcephaly except for random co-occurrence.”….”An alternative cause of microcephaly in Brazil could be the pesticide pyriproxyfen, which is cross-reactive with retinoic acid, which causes microcephaly, and is being used in drinking water.”(99)

Dr Tiago Baptista Questions Zika as Sole Cause of Microcephaly

Maternal viral infection with rubella or cytomegalovirus have been known to cause fetal malformation and fetal demise. There is no doubt that viral illness during pregnancy is best avoided.(47-55) However, Dr Tiago Baptista in a 2016 BMJ article questions “whether the surge in reported cases of microcephaly is entirely due to Zika virus infection“(55) He says:

“The risk of microcephaly after maternal infection is estimated at roughly one in 100 women… This is a relatively low risk compared with other causal infections such as cytomegalovirus.”(55)

A Distraction From the Real Cause- Exposure to Glyphosate Causes Microcephaly and other Congenital Anomalies

I suggest that the Zika virus is merely a distraction away from the real cause, agrichemical exposure from Monsanto’s Round-Up Herbicide, glyphosate, (1-4)

Dr Alejandra Paganelli reported in 2010 that “Glyphosate-based herbicides produce teratogenic effects on vertebrates by impairing retinoic acid signaling.” (8)

Dr Paganelli concludes: “(congenital malformations) “produced by Glyphosate Based Herbicides are mainly a consequence of the increase of endogenous retinoid activity. ” (8)

Dr Sylvia Lopez

In 2012, Dr Silvia L. Lopez reviewed the effects of agricultural chemicals, glyphosate based herbicides, in human and animal models.(9) She says:

“It is very well known that acute or chronic increase of retinoic acid (RA) levels leads to teratogenic effects during human pregnancy and in experimental models. The characteristic features displayed by Retinoic Acid embryopathy in humans include brain abnormalities such as microcephaly, microphtalmia, and impairment of hindbrain development; abnormal external and middle ears (microtia or anotia), mandibular and midfacial underdevelopment, and cleft palate.” (9) Note: Retinoic Acid is Vitamin A Derivative.

Dr Benitez-Leite

Dr Benitez-Leite reported 52 cases of malformations in babies born of women exposed to agricultural chemicals. The congenital malformations observed include anencephaly, microcephaly, facial defects, myelomeningocele, cleft palate, ear malformations, polydactily, syndactily all consistent with the well-known and expected syndrome caused by upregulation of the Retinoic Acid pathway.(10) Left image Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide contains glyphosate.

Upregulation of Retinoic Acid Pathway

A number of reports have linked arial spraying with the mosquito larvicide pyriproxyfen to birth defects such as microcephaly in the crop sprayed towns of Northeast Brazil.(106-108) Pyriproxyfen disrupts retinoic acid (vitramin A) signalling, a known mechanism for microcephaly (106-108) In 1995, Dr Kenneth Rothman reported in NEJM that High Vitamin A Intake causes birth defects. (109)

Increasing Anencephaly in Yakima Valley in Washington State

Another mechanism is glyphosate disruption of folate metabolsm as discussed below in the Yakima Washington State case. (35-37)

Over three years from 2010 to 2013, the Washington State Department of Health reported an unusual increase in anencephalic babies born in Yakima, Benton and Franklin counties, four times higher than the national average. (33-34)

Anencephaply, microcephaly and spina bifida are all related disorders of neural tube closure associated with maternal folate deficiency. Maternal folate supplementation is preventive. Maternal folate supplementation in Yakima was not at issue, as this was similar to the national average. Barbara Peterson, in Farm Wars, makes a compelling case for glyphosate exposure as the cause, since the Yakima river running through the affected counties had been heavily treated with glyphosate for weed control during that time period.(29) Left image Yakima River Washington State.

Glyphosate Disrupts Folate Metabolism

Glyphosate disruption of folate metabolism is discussed by Stephanie Seneff in her May 2016 article on Weston Price.(35) Glyphosate acts as an antibiotic, killing friendly bacteria by blocking the Shikimate pathway. These friendly bacterial are also involved in bacterial conversion of folic acid to methyl folate, its active form. Maternal methylfolate deficiency is associated with neural tube defects in the developing embryo.(85-87)

Glyphosate Disrupts Glycine Metabolism

Stephanie Seneff’s article then discusses how glyphosate disrupts glycine decarboxylase metabolism, known to cause neural tube defects in animal studies and humans.(36-37)

Glyphosate is the amino acid glycine with an added phosphate group, so glyphosate may readily displace glycine in various biochemical reactions. Glyphosate disrupts glycine decarboxylase by displacing glycine as a substrate. In addition, glyphosate replaces glycine at insertion sites in amino acid chains during protein synthesis, producing defective enzymes (35). Glyphosate is basically the amino acid, glycine with a phosphate group added on to it.

Glyphosate is a Patented Antimicrobial, Anti-Folate Drug

Glyphosate is actually patented as an anti-microbial drug. (83,84) Glyphosate serves as an anti-folate agent working in synergy with other anti-folate drugs.(58,61) Other anti-folate drugs in common use include the urinary tract antibiotic, Bactrim (trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole) the rheumatology drug, methotrexate, and the anti-seizure drug Dilantin (phentoin). Maternal exposure to anti-folate drugs such as methotrexate Bactrim and Dilantin increase risk of neural tube defects in the fetus up to six-fold. (85-87) Maternal folate supplementation has been shown to reduce incidence of fetal neural tube defects (NTD), and folic acid fortification in food supply was mandated in 1998. (85-87)(100-103)

Glyphosate Inhibits the Shikimate Pathway

Glyphosate’s known mode of action is inhibition of the shikimate pathway in plants, fungi, bacteria and parasites.(58) Glyphosate blocks the pathway which produces Folate, Ubiquinone (Co-Q10), Vitamin K, and the aromatic amino acids tryptophan, phenylalanine, and tyrosine.

Government Regulators Deemed Glyphosate Safe for Humans

Government regulators deemed glyphosate safe for us humans because we lack the shikimate pathway. They forgot to consider that we humans depend on the shikimate pathway in plants and gut bacteria for our folate (vitamin B9), to prevents neural tube defects. If your lunch salad comes from an agricultural field treated with glyphosate which blocks the plant’s ability to synthesize folate, how much folate are you getting in your meal ? If you are ingesting glyphosate in your food, blocking your gut bacteria from synthesing folate, how soon will you be rendered folate deficient? Dr Bekaert says in 2008,

“Humans cannot synthesize folates (vitamin B9) and thus have to rely on plant food supplying these essential vitamins.“(104)

Dr Craig Roberts suggests that Glyphosate may serve as anti-folate, anti-parasitic drug ,He says:(58)

” it is likely that the shikimate pathway is important for supply of folate precursors in this parasite….inhibitors of EPSP synthase (such as glyphosate) can act in synergy with conventional antifolates and may be a useful addition to the agents used against apicomplexan parasites.”(58)

A quote from a University of Chicago Press Release 1998 (61) explains that Glyphosate blocks production of folate:

“Effective new ways to inhibit parasites that cause malaria, toxoplasmosis and cryptosporidiosis” June 25, 1998.(61)

“Dr. McLeod’s team showed that glyphosate, …could block the production of folate, inhibiting parasite growth and survival. Glyphosate proved effective against malaria strains that were resistant to an anti-malarial medicine, pyrimethamine, which interrupts folate processing at a different point. To confirm the finding, they demonstrated that these folate-starved parasites could be rescued, in the test tube, by giving them folate.”(61)

Brazil Annual Pesticide Sales Surpasses the US

Left Image courtesy of Reuters. Brazil sales of herbicide (glyphosate) exceeds that of US.(81)

According to Paulo Prada in her 2015 article, Brazil has a huge appetite for pesticides and herbicides, surpassing annual sales in the US.(81)

Poalo Prado explains that in Northeast Brazil, irrigation canals were built, transforming previously arid land into fertile farm land. These open air irrigation canals are heavily contaminated with herbicides and pesticides liberally applied to the crop fields. Life is primitive for the agricultural workers who live without piped in water for their dwellings. The local workers use the open air irrigation canals for their drinking water, thus are heavily exposed to herbicide and pesticide runoff.

House Passes 1.1 Billion Zika Virus Bill. Methyl-Folate is Cheaper.

Instead of spending 1.1 Billion dollars on a “controversial” Zika Virus Bill, I have a better idea for prevention of microcephaly and neural tube defects. (90) Suppose we instead allocate 100 million dollars to give out free methyl-folate tablets to all pregnant women exposed to glyphosate here in the US, and in Brazil. That would solve the problem at a fraction of the cost, saving a Billion Dollars.(90)

53 Countries Have Mandatory Flour Fortification with Folate

Folate fortification of flour for prevention of neural tube defects (anencephaly, microcephaly, spina bifida etc.) is mandated in 53 countries. Fortification of flour with folic acid was mandated in the US in 1998, the most successful public health measure in history, with reduction of neural tube defects by 36%.(100-103) In 2009, Dr Oakley declared this success story a “modern miracle of epidemiology”.(103)

Study Blood Folate Levels in North East Brazil

Why not allocate research funds to study blood folate levels in women in Northeast Brazil at high risk for having babies with neural tube defects? This was done here in the US before and after starting folate fortification in 1998, showing reduction incidence of neural tube defects by 36%.(101) Folate deficiency (blood folate levels less than 3 ng/ml)) decreased from 21% to less than 1% of the population. (101)

In Australia, mandatory fortification of bread with folate and iodine was introduced in 2009, resulting in a 50-80 per cent reduction in neural tube defects in at-risk indigenous women and teenagers.(100-112)

Reducing Microcephaly in Brazil with Folate Fortification

Studies done in Brazil shows folate deficiency is severe, affecting 94% among the poor.(113) Folate fortification of flour in three south American countries (Brazil, Argentina, Chile) resulted in significant reduction in 52 different fetal anomalies including reduction in microcephaly and anencephaly.(114) Currently all South American countries except Venezuala have mandatory folate fortification legislation.(115) In populations using folate fortification there have been decreases in neural tube defects from 30-50%.(115)

How is Such an Error Possible ?

You might ask the obvious question, “how is such an error in thinking possible” that the government would waste a billion dollars on Zika instead of Folate Fortification? This is called CrimeStop or “Protective Stupidity“, aptly described in 1984 by George Orwell (91):

“The mind should develop a blind spot whenever a dangerous thought presented itself….Crimestop, they called it in Newspeak….the Party says the earth is flat’, ‘the party says that ice is heavier than water’—and trained himself in not seeing or not understanding the arguments that contradicted them.”

“Crimestop means the faculty of stopping short, as though by instinct, at the threshold of any dangerous thought. It includes the power of not grasping analogies, of failing to perceive logical errors, of misunderstanding the simplest arguments…”…”Crimestop, in short, means protective stupidity.”(91)

Using Fear and Smear Tactics to Distract Attention from Monsanto

This article in the Huffington Post Feb 16 is typical of the Monsanto tactics to distract attention away from Roundup glyphosate as the cause of the birth defects in agricultural workers in Brazil; A Viral Story Links The Zika Crisis To Monsanto. Don’t Believe It. by Anna Almendrala Senior Healthy Living Editor Huffington Post. Anna’s piece is pure Monsanto propaganda masquerading as journalism, don’t believe a word of it. If you trust anything Monsanto says, then I have a bridge to sell you.

Monsanto has known for decades that Glyphosate causes birth defects, see this report: Roundup and birth defects. Is the public being kept in the dark ? by Michael Antoniou Earth Open Source June 2011

Search Google Scholar for articles with key words “microcephaly pesticide“ : you will see 2160 articles pop up.

Glyphosate is “Probably Carcinogenic to Humans”

A number of studies show glyphosate exposure doubles the incidence of Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma.(92) As reported in Lancet Oncology by Dr Kathryn Guyton, on March, 2015, 17 experts from 11 countries met in Lyon France and classified glyphosate as “probably carcinogenic to humans” (89)

Zika Distraction from Glyphosate – The Elephant in the Room

Certainly, maternal viral illness with Rubella, (CMV) cytomegalovirus and Zika are all risk factors for fetal demise, and fetal malformations, and are best avoided.(93-95) However, the Zika Virus is a distraction from the real cause of the problem, massive glyphosate exposure to pregnant agricultural workers in Brazil. Glyphosate is a patented anti-folate drug, Anti-folate drugs are known to cause microcephaly and neural tube defects in animals and humans.

Professor Don Huber, GMO Food and Glyphosate

Increased incidence of birth defects in the population caused by exposure to the anti-folate agent, glyphosate is only the “tip of the iceberg”. The adverse health consequences of GMO food and glyphosate contamination of our food and water supply are much more extensive as outlined in a series of articles posted on the Stephanie Seneff home page. Here is a quote from Professor Don M. Huber:(88) from his document GMO Failed Promises Flawed Science Serious Health Safety Issue

” Future historians may well look back upon our time and write, not about how many pounds of pesticides we did or did not apply, but about how willing we are to sacrifice our children and jeopardize future generations for this massive experiment we call genetic engineering that is based on failed promises and flawed science, just to benefit the bottom line of a commercial enterprise.” Dr. Don M. Huber

Link to this article: http://wp.me/p3gFbV-3En

Jeffrey Dach MD
7450 Griffin Road Suite 190
Davie, Fl 33314
954-792-4663

Articles with related interest:

Dont Ask for HIV Test Ask For Glyphosate Test

Curing Autism with Antibiotics

Berberine Antdote for an Epidemic

References

For references, please view original publication.

https://greenmedinfo.com/blog/zika-virus-or-roundup-herbicide-cause-microcephaly

Democratic Party’s total disregard for Palestinian lives – Day 320
[email protected] August 23, 2024 creeping annexation, deir al balah, DNC, gaza evacuation, gaza polio, kamala harris, Noa Argamani, tulkarem
DNC attendees cover their ears as the names of dead Palestinian children are read as they leave the convention (photo)
Compilation of news reports by IAK staff

DNC acceptance speech: what did Kamala say about Gaza?

Responsible Statecraft reports: This week’s protests, which saw thousands of antiwar demonstrators take to the streets (lined with scores of Chicago police) in and around the United Center pose a critical question to the Harris/Waltz ticket: Can they bridge the yawning gulf that divides the street and the establishment on the matter of Israel’s war on Palestine?

The answer is, probably not.

On Thursday night during her own showcase speech in which she formally accepted her party’s nomination, Harris appeared full-throated in favor of ending the war in Gaza. Here are her full (brief) remarks on the issue:

With respect to the war in Gaza, President Biden and I are working around the clock, because now is the time to get a hostage deal and a ceasefire deal done. …. And let me be clear: I will always stand up for Israel’s right to defend itself, and I will always ensure Israel has the ability to defend itself, because the people of Israel must never again face the war that a terrorist organization called Hamas caused on October 7, including unspeakable sexual violence* and the massacre of young people at a music festival.**

At the same time, what has happened in Gaza over the past 10 months is devastating so many innocent lives lost, desperate, hungry people fleeing for safety, over and over again, the scale of suffering is heartbreaking. President Biden and I are working to end this war, such that Israel is secure, the hostages are released, the suffering in Gaza ends, and the Palestinian people can realize their right to dignity, security, freedom and self determination.

*While Israel has made allegations of “systematic sexual violence” against Hamas on October 7th, it has yet to provide forensic evidence or witnesses. The allegations persist apparently because American mainstream media continue to ignore the facts, though numerous websites have reported about the deficiencies in the coverage.

**A number of the Israeli soldiers and civilians killed on October 7 were shown to have been killed by Israeli fire – a fact that is absent from the official Israeli narrative and Western mainstream media.

As antiwar activist and author Norman Solomon has noted, Harris “has toed President Biden’s war line, while at times voicing sympathy for the victims of the Gaza war that’s made possible by policies that she supports. Her words of compassion have yet to translate into opposing the pipeline of weapons and ammunition to the Israeli military as it keeps slaughtering Palestinian civilians.”






Supporters of Joe Biden use signs to cover up a “Stop Arming Israel” banner at the Democratic National Convention on Aug. 19, 2024, in Chicago. Photo: Joe Lamberti for The Washington Post via Getty Images
Supporters of Joe Biden use signs to cover up a “Stop Arming Israel” banner at the Democratic National Convention on Aug. 19, 2024, in Chicago. Photo: Joe Lamberti for The Washington Post via Getty Images (photo)
Israeli army announces new evacuation order in south

Al Jazeera reports:

The Israeli spokesperson for Arabic language media has announced a new evacuation order for the Gaza Strip.

Residents were warned to evacuate several areas in Khan Younis governorate in southern Gaza, including Bani Suheila, Sheikh Nasser, Barbakh and as-Satr al-Gharbi, Avichay Adraee posted on X.

The order comes after thousands of Palestinians fled parts of Deir el-Balah as the Israeli military issued an evacuation order and its forces advanced deeper into the overcrowded central Gaza city.

The Israeli military has targeted areas it had designated as safe zones on several occasions previously, killing Palestinians taking refuge there.


Gaza polio patient paralyzed, UN to begin vaccination soon

Middle East Eye reports:

The UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa) says that it will begin vaccinating Gaza’s children for polio at the end of the month.

The news comes after the besieged enclave recorded its first case of polio last week, and as the WHO confirmed that a a 10-month-old baby was now paralyzed due to the disease.

“It is not enough to bring the vaccines into Gaza [and] protect the cold chain,” Phillippe Lazzarrini, commissioner general of Unrwa, said on X. “To have an impact, the vaccines must end up in the mouths of every child under the age of 10.”

Gaza’s Health Ministry has said that a vaccination campaign alone will not prevent the spread of polio “in the absence of clean water, personal hygiene supplies, the spread of sewage among the tents of the displaced, and the absence of a healthy environment.”

It is not clear whether Israel has allowed WHO polio vaccines to enter Gaza.

The polio virus has been detected in Gaza's sewage, which flows through areas with displaced persons and residential zones due to infrastructure destruction, and “represents a new health crisis.”
The polio virus has been detected in Gaza’s sewage, which flows through areas with displaced persons and residential zones due to infrastructure destruction, and “represents a new health crisis.” (photo)
MSF says Israel’s new evacuation orders are ‘inhumane’

From Doctors Without Borders:

Doctors Without Borders, known by its French acronym MSF, said its staff are among the thousands of people who are having to flee central Gaza after Israel’s military issued new evacuation orders for Deir el-Balah and Khan Younis.

“The continuous forced displacement of people is inhumane,” MSF project coordinator Jacob Granger said in a statement.

“People have no belongings left, nowhere left to go. There is no room to put tents up. The overcrowding, severe lack of water, and minimal sanitation services are fuelling the spread of diseases. We are unable to keep up with the overwhelming needs.”



Israeli army invades ‘most crowded displacement camp in history,’ bombs Palestinians in shelters

Mondoweiss reports:

In a press release last Sunday, the Deir al-Balah municipality said that the waves of evacuation reaching Deir al-Balah were causing an unprecedented number of displaced people to cram into a tiny zone. According to the statement, Deir al-Balah’s total area is 42 square kilometers, and almost a million displaced people are now distributed across 200 displacement centers there.

“This makes Deir al-Balah the most crowded displacement camp in history,” the municipality said.

On Tuesday, the Israeli army bombed the local market in Deir al-Balah, killing 9 civilians. Several hours later, the army bombarded a school in Gaza City sheltering 700 people, killing 10 people, according to the Palestinian Civil Defense.

Civil Defense teams were forced to cut up a martyr’s body to pull him out of the rubble, which had been stuck under three collapsed ceilings inside the school. Survivors say that it was one of the most horrific scenes they have witnessed since the start of the war.

(Read the full article here.)

Palestinians living in the area flee to the Al Mawasi district, the west part of the city with their belongings following the Israeli army’s evacuation warning at Hamad area in Khan Yunis, Gaza on August 11, 2024 [Ashraf Amra/Anadolu Agency]
Palestinians living in the area flee to the Al Mawasi district, the west part of the city with their belongings following the Israeli army’s evacuation warning at Hamad area in Khan Yunis, Gaza on August 11, 2024 [Ashraf Amra/Anadolu Agency] (photo)
Netanyahu’s goal is ‘creeping occupation’ of Gaza: Ha’aretz

From Ha’aretz:

Ha’aretz writer Aluf Benn said in an editorial that the Israeli prime minister is “torpedoing” ceasefire negotiations because he ultimately wants a “prolonged occupation of the Gaza Strip”.

“Caravan after caravan, outpost after outpost” Netanyahu is planning a “creeping occupation” of Gaza, Benn said, adding that the Israeli prime minister’s recent insistence on maintaining Israeli control of “defense and strategic assets”, such as the Philadelphi and Netzarim corridors illustrates his intentions.

The editorial came as the families of Israeli captives held in Gaza criticized Netanyahu’s handling of the truce talks, saying the “full and direct responsibility for the fate of the negotiations is on the prime minister”.

POTUS tweet, October 18, 2023 "I spoke with Prime Minister Netanyahu regarding the situation on the ground, security assistance and humanitarian needs, and information on unaccounted Americans. I asked tough questions as a friend of Israel. We will continue to deter any actor wanting to widen this conflict."
POTUS tweet, October 18, 2023 “I spoke with Prime Minister Netanyahu regarding the situation on the ground, security assistance and humanitarian needs, and information on unaccounted Americans. I asked tough questions as a friend of Israel. We will continue to deter any actor wanting to widen this conflict.” (photo)
West Bank: Three Palestinians killed in Israeli strike on Tulkarem camp

Al Jazeera reports:

Three Palestinians have been killed in an Israeli air attack on a house in the Tulkarem refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian Ministry of Health says.

The aerial attack today came as the Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, said fighters from its Tulkarem Battalion clashed with Israeli soldiers in the camp and detonated explosive devices targeting military vehicles.

Reporting from Tulkarem, Al Jazeera’s Nida Ibrahim said on Thursday that the raid was ongoing 12 hours later in the congested area, with sounds of explosives and gunfire heard and drones flying above.



Jewish terror is jeopardizing Israel’s existence: Shin Bet chief

Middle East Eye reports:

In a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, government ministers and the attorney general, Ronen Bar, the head of the Shin Bet security service, warned that Jewish terrorism was endangering Israel’s existence.

Bar says that those he calls Jewish terrorists “want to cause the system to lose control, causing indescribable damage to Israel”.

He also said that police incompetence and “perhaps a sense of hidden support” is increasing.

(Read the full article here.)

A group of Jewish settlers under the protection of Israeli soldiers raids the Old City area of Hebron, West Bank on August 17, 2024. [Wisam Hashlamoun – Anadolu Agency]
A group of Jewish settlers under the protection of Israeli soldiers raids the Old City area of Hebron, West Bank on August 17, 2024. [Wisam Hashlamoun – Anadolu Agency] (photo)
‘They Did Not Hit Me’ – Former Prisoner Argamani Challenges Israeli Media over Distorted Claims

Palestine Chronicle reports:

Former Israeli prisoner Noa Argamani has accused the Israeli media of taking her statements out of context and denied claims that she was beaten by members of the Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas.

Through her Instagram page, Argamani clarified that the Qassam Brigades did not harm her physically or cut her hair, but she sustained injuries when a wall collapsed during an Israeli airstrike.

“I cannot stay silent about what the Israeli media has done to me over the past 24 hours, taking my words out of context,” she stated, adding: “I am a victim of the October 7 operation, and I refuse to be victimized again by the Israeli media.”

Argamani explained that Al-Qassam members “did not hit me while I was in captivity, nor did they cut my hair.”

“I was injured by the collapse of a wall caused by an Israeli airstrike,” she highlighted.

In June, the Israeli military announced that Argamani and three other Israeli prisoners were rescued during a military operation in the Nuseirat camp in central Gaza, which resulted in the killing and injuring of hundreds of Palestinian civilians.

Since her return, Argamani has expressed frustration over the distortion of her accounts, particularly concerning her treatment while in Gaza.

(Read the full article here.)

NOTE: In reality, many of the released Israeli captives have been in good health. They described their fear of being bombed by Israel, but did not report torture or rape (for which at least one was harassed). In the case of Noa Argamni, reportedly the worst complaints she had of her captors was that she “had to cook and wash dishes for the family,” and was not able to shower often. She was able to walk outside, but “was forced to dress like a Palestinian woman.”



Released Gaza captive declines Netanyahu ‘PR’ meeting

Al Jazeera reports:

Margalit Moses, a 77-year-old Israeli who was freed from captivity in Gaza in November, has declined Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s invitation to meet him today, saying she believes it would be a publicity stunt.

“Thank you for the invitation, but I will not take part in the meeting for photography and public relations purposes while my friends are languishing in the Hamas tunnels in Gaza,” she wrote in a public statement.

“In light of the reports of another [hostage-ceasefire] deal being thwarted on your part to release the abductees, I see no reason to come to a meeting with someone who proves by his actions that releasing the hostages is not top of mind and abandons them to their deaths,” she added.

Moses was abducted from Kibbutz Nir Oz along with her ex-husband Gadi Moshe Moses during the Hamas-led assault on southern Israel on October 7. Gadi remains in captivity in Gaza.

War will continue, even with a deal: Israeli official

From Times of Israel:

An Israeli official told The Times of Israel that a ceasefire deal would not mean the end of the war in Gaza.

“So long as Hamas doesn’t agree to a deal, we will continue fighting,” the official was quoted as saying. “Even if they do, the war will continue. Of course, if there is a deal, there will be a lull in the fighting in the first stage. But we will continue fighting until we achieve all of our war aims.”

The insistence on the war continuing echoes the words of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has himself insisted that any ceasefire deal still allow the Israelis to continue to attack Gaza, despite the US insistence that a deal would lead to an end to the war.

Hamas has repeatedly stated that any deal to secure the release of captives held in Gaza lead to a lasting ceasefire and the withdrawal of Israeli forces from the enclave.


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STATISTICS OCTOBER 7 – AUGUST 22:

Palestinian death toll from October 7, 2023 – August 22, 2024: at least 40,859* (40,265 in Gaza* – 11,445 women (30%), 16,251 children as of July 22. [The Ministry’s figures have been contested by the Israeli authorities, although they have been accepted as accurate by Israeli intelligence services, the UN, and WHO. These data are supported by independent analyses, comparing changes in the number of deaths of UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) staff with those reported by the Ministry, which found claims of data fabrication implausible.]
This is expected to be a significant undercount since thousands of those killed have yet to be identified – and at least 637 in the West Bank (~147 children). This does not include an estimated 10,000 more still buried under rubble (4,900 women and children). Euro-Med Monitor reports 46,848 Palestinian deaths.
Lancet: “Applying a conservative estimate of four indirect deaths per one direct death9 to the 37,396 deaths reported, it is not implausible to estimate that up to 186 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza.
Ralph Nader earlier estimated 200,000 Palestinians may have been killed in Gaza.
At least 45 Palestinians have died in Israeli prisons (27 from Gaza, 18 from West Bank).
At least 41 Palestinians have died due to malnutrition**.
About 1.9 million of Gaza’s 2.3 million population are currently displaced.
Almost 500,000 Gazans are currently experiencing catastrophic levels of food insecurity.
Palestinian injuries from October 7 – August 22: at least 98,401 (including at least 93,144 in Gaza and 5,420 in the West Bank, including 830 children). [It remains unknown how man Americans are among the casualties in Gaza.]
Reported Israeli death toll from October 7, 2023 – August 22, 2024: ~1,457 (~1,139 on October 7, 2023, of which ~32 were Americans, and ~36 were children); 293*** military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza; 25 military and civilians in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Israel) and~10,000 injured.
NOTE: It is unknown at this time how many of the deaths and injuries of Israelis on October 7 were caused by Israeli soldiers.
*Previously, IAK did not include 471 Gazans killed in the Al Ahli hospital blast since the source of the projectile was being disputed. However, given that much evidence points to Israel as the culprit, Israel had previously bombed the hospital and has attacked many others, Israel is prohibiting outside experts from investigating the scene, and since the UN and other agencies are including the deaths from the attack in their cumulative totals, if Americans knew is now also doing so.
**Euro-Med Monitor reports that Gaza’s elderly are dying at an alarmingly high rate. The majority die at home and are buried either close to their residences or in makeshift graves dispersed across the Strip. There are currently more than 140 such cemeteries. Additionally, according to Euromed, thousands have died from starvation, malnourishment, and inadequate medical care; these are considered indirect victims as they were not registered in hospitals.
***Approximately ten of the deaths listed above were Israeli soldiers killed by Hezbollah in fighting at the Israel-Lebanon border. The figure does not include the reportedly 53 Israeli soldiers – nearly 16% of the total Israeli military deaths – killed due to friendly fire in Gaza and other military-related accidents.
† For most of the conflict, women and children accounted for about 70% of deaths in Gaza, with children making up a little over 40% of those killed, according to official statistics.
Find previous daily casualty figures and daily news updates here.
Hover over each bar for exact numbers.
Source: IsraelPalestineTimeline.org
Human rights reports on Israel-Palestine (regularly updated)
What Harris’s Jewish outreach director said at a private DNC afterparty
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Israeli army probe covered up “friendly fire” killings on October 7
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Israel has turbocharged West Bank housing demolitions under the cover of war

https://israelpalestinenews.org/democratic-partys-total-disregard-for-palestinian-lives-day-320/

Where to go when 89 percent of Gaza is a war zone? – Day 315
[email protected] August 18, 2024 campus protest, dnc protest, evacuation orders gaza, gaza safe zone, israeli espionage, twins killed in gaza, water in gaza, west bank deaths, zawayda attack

Dr. Yasser Khan treated this six-year-old girl, Aseel, during his time at the European Hospital in Gaza. Khan received permission from the hospital to share images of the patients he helped. (photo)
The Guardian reports: Student activists are planning a fresh wave of pro-Palestine protests at US colleges this fall, boosted by a “summer school” led by organizers over the break, ramping up coordination and strategy in the wake of police crackdowns on campuses this past spring.

Despite academic suspensions, doxing attempts and the arrests of more than 3,000 students nationwide, the students who occupied their campuses’ lawns with tents last semester are gearing up for another – possibly bigger – round of demonstrations “on all fronts, by all means”, calling once again for a ceasefire in Gaza and for their colleges to divest from financial ties to Israel.

The National Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) organization held online education and training sessions this summer, offering unofficial courses to students who belong to specific student organizations – such as Jewish Voices for Peace, the Muslim Students Association and local SJP university chapters around the country – on the history of Palestine but also on how to organize, with the aim of creating a more unified and better prepared mass protest movement.

“The purpose of it was kind of to have all these people that are involved in SJP itself to build different workshops to be more educated on organizing and to be prepared for certain situations,” said Sereen Haddad, a Palestinian American undergraduate student at Virginia Commonwealth University, a public institution in that state’s capital, Richmond.

NSJP and local SJP chapters have been accused by their opponents of sympathizing with Hamas – a claim the organization vehemently rejects – and have been suspended on some college campuses including Columbia University in New York, Brandeis University in Massachusetts and George Washington University in Washington DC, for allegedly breaking campus rules.

RECOMMENDED READING: Detailed study finds 99% of pro-Palestine protests at US universities are peaceful

Are these people Hamas? Photo by Justin Tallis/AFP via Getty Images
Photo by Justin Tallis/AFP via Getty Images (photo)
What impact will pro-Palestine protests have on the DNC? Tens of thousands expected in Chicago’s streets

The Independent reports: When the Democratic National Convention gets underway in Chicago this week, it is expected to be accompanied by the largest pro-Palestine protests in the city’s history, according to advocacy groups.

Pro-Palestine demonstrators aren’t new to Chicago. They have been marching on the city’s streets every weekend since October 7th.

The DNC, where Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are expected to accept their nominations, faces significant disruption from protests, with Chicago home to the largest community of Palestinians in the country. Tens of thousands are anticipated to mobilize.

“It’ll be the largest protest in the history of Chicago for Palestinian rights, specifically,” Hatem Abudayyeh, national chair for the US Palestinian Community Network, told Block Club Chicago.

There has been a months-long court battle over the protest route. Advocacy groups requested parade permits to march near the United Center but were repeatedly denied by city officials. The city, in turn, offered the groups an alternative route, a requirement that prompted them to sue the ​​city and Commissioner of the Chicago Department of Transportation, alleging First Amendment violations.

The groups then asked a federal judge to extend their route by a mile, and move the route closer to the United Center. The judge denied that request on August 12, partly due to the route interfering with the Secret Service perimeter, court filings show.

Organizers said they plan to appeal the decision, according to ABC7. It’s unclear whether the groups will stick to those restrictions or will march without a permit.

“We’re going to march regardless, but we’re fighting for the best route possible,” Faayani Aboma Mijana, a spokesperson for the March on the DNC coalition, told Semafor. “We’ve got our park permit, but the City has refused to allow us to use port-a-potties, a stage, and a sound system.”

Estimates say Chicago could see anywhere from 30,000 to 100,000 demonstrators.

https://israelpalestinenews.org/where-to-go-89-percent-gaza-war-zone-day-315/

Gaza records first polio case in 25 years – Day 314
[email protected] August 17, 2024 arms embargo, ceasefire, DNC, freedom flotilla, from the river to the sea, humanitarian aid, icc arrest warrant, Jayson Gillham, Mark Smith FCDO, Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, pogrom, polio, safe zone, UC Irvine, uncommitted movement
Smoke rises from the Hamad area following an Israeli attack, which came immediately after Israel issued an evacuation warning to the southern Gaza Strip city of Khan Younis on August 16, 2024 [Doaa Albaz/Anadolu Agency] (photo)
Polio epidemic begins; new flyers about Gaza to distribute; just 11 percent of Gaza for Gazans; Israeli settlers carry out pogrom in Palestinian town of Jit; Gaza Freedom Flotilla drawing near – will it break Israel’s blockade?; Israeli leaders mull how to dodge ICC arrest warrants; German courts grapple with the meaning of “from the river to the sea”; awaiting UC-Irvine’s fall policy on Palestine protest; Dems want ceasefire and arms embargo, but will Kamala listen?; senior UK diplomat resigns over Gaza; Australia’s classical music scene scuffle over Gaza; “Blue Vote Red Line” movement continues to gather signatures; more.

By IAK staff, from reports.

Gaza records first polio case as UN calls for truce to tackle virus

Al Jazeera reports: The Health Ministry in Gaza has said that it detected the first polio case in the besieged enclave, hours after United Nations officials called for a pause in the fighting to enable a vaccination campaign for children against the virus.

In a statement on Friday, the Health Ministry blamed the “difficult” conditions in Gaza – including the spread of sewage water in the streets, shortages of medical supplies and lack of personal hygiene products due to the Israeli blockade – for the emergence of the virus in the territory.

Hours earlier, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres had called for humanitarian pauses in the war in Gaza to conduct a polio vaccine campaign.

“It is impossible to conduct a polio vaccination campaign with war raging all over,” he told reporters at the UN headquarters in New York.

Guterres appealed for assurances of humanitarian pauses to be provided immediately from the warring parties as he warned that preventing and containing the spread of polio in Gaza would take a massive coordinated and urgent effort.

“Let’s be clear: The ultimate vaccine for polio is peace and an immediate humanitarian ceasefire,” Guterres said. “But in any case, a polio pause is a must.”

(Read the full article here.)

Details of the proposed vaccination campaign are here.

After Israel destroyed Gaza's water and sewage systems, filthy water runs or stands stagnant all over the enclave, carrying polio and other diseases.
After Israel destroyed Gaza’s water and sewage systems, filthy water runs or stands stagnant all over the enclave, carrying polio and other diseases. (collage)
New fact sheets about Gaza to be distributed in Chicago and around the country

If Americans knew has produced two new flyers printed front and back with facts about Gaza for educating Americans.

These will be available in Chicago at the demonstrations at the Democratic National Convention for everyone to distribute widely. To obtain these, email [email protected]. Below is one of the flyers:


Front and back sides of one of the new factsheets about Gaza. (IAK)
Latest evacuation order leaves just 11 percent of Gaza for Gazans; food kitchens in crisis

OCHA reports: The Israeli military issued an order on 16 August that affects six blocs in Deir al Balah and Khan Younis, including two within the Israeli-designated zone in Al Mawasi in western Khan Younis.

This is one of the largest evacuation orders affecting the zone to date, and it shrinks the size of the so-called “humanitarian area” to about 41 square kilometers, or 11 per cent of the total area of the Gaza Strip.

Initial mapping indicates that this order affects 122 internally displaced persons sites, makeshift shelters, and collective centers that are collectively hosting over 170,000 people.

There is an urgent need for increased hot meal capacity in Gaza due to recurrent waves of displacement, the World Food Programme (WFP) reported on 12 August. Many community kitchens in central and southern Gaza struggle due to unstable supplies of humanitarian cargo and the lack of food and fuel.

The situation has worsened since 22 July following the issuance of multiple evacuation orders in Deir al Balah and Khan Younis, which forced the relocation of four kitchens and the closure of 19 food delivery points.

Moreover, in Deir al Balah, about 1,400 metric tons of food stocks in one of the warehouses became inaccessible and only one WFP warehouse with about 3,000 metric tons of commodities is currently accessible but is insufficient to meet the August cycle requirements.

In July, 70 community kitchens in Gaza supported by WFP provided around 11.5 million hot meals to more than 200,000 people, the majority in central Gaza.

Of the total food cargo entering through Kerem Shalom Crossing in July, only eight per cent was humanitarian aid and the rest were commercial trucks. There was reportedly a slight improvement in food availability and diversity in Deir al Balah and Khan Younis, but a deterioration in other governorates, and persistent challenges to market functionality including high food prices, lack of liquidity and the emergence of “thieves markets.”



Israeli settlers rampage across Palestinian town in latest West Bank pogrom

The Cradle reports: More than 70 armed Jewish settlers invaded the Palestinian town of Jit in the occupied West Bank on 15 August, firing bullets and tear gas at residents and setting several homes and cars and other property on fire, CNN reported.

Settlers killed 23-year-old Rashid Sedda during the pogrom. The Palestinian Authority’s Ministry of Health confirmed the 23-year-old Palestinian died due to a gunshot wound to the chest.

“We have attacks but nothing to this level,” the head of Jit’s village council, Nasser Sedda, told CNN. “We haven’t seen anything like this before, and without a prior warning. They caught the people off guard – women, children, and elders were there.”

“Dozens of Israeli civilians, some of them masked, entered the town of Jit and set fire to vehicles and structures in the area, hurled rocks and Molotov cocktails,” the Israeli military said in a statement.

Haaretz reported that the only person arrested after the settler raid on the village of Jit was suspected of interfering with a policeman and was released. No arrests have yet been made for those involved in the pogrom.


New film from the Freedom Flotilla Coalition:



And as this IAK video reported eight years ago, Israeli blockades of Gaza began years before Hamas came to power:



Gaza Freedom Flotilla: Activists prepare to defy Israel naval blockade of Gaza

Reuters reports: Peace activists from several countries are setting out on a converted trawler to defy an Israeli blockade and deliver humanitarian aid to Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

“The purpose of this mission is to send a message that civil society is not OK with what’s happening in Gaza,” said Fellipe Lopes, the Portuguese media coordinator of the Freedom Flotilla Coalition on board the ship, “Handala” during a stopover in Malta.

It will be a trip fraught with danger. Another coalition ship on a similar mission to Gaza in 2010 was stopped and boarded by Israeli troops, and nine activists died. Other ships were similarly stopped and boarded, without loss of life.

“We expect to encounter resistance throughout our mission,” said Australian activist, Michael Coleman.

“Ours is not an illegal activity in any shape or form. The International Court of Justice has asked them to grant unfettered access to aid into Gaza and I implore them to let us and other aids through immediately,” he said.

The “Handala” was visited in Malta by 78-year-old retired US Army Colonel and diplomat, Ann Wright, who was on board another coalition ship boarded by Israeli troops in 2010, in the incident in which nine activists died.

“These people are very brave, because we don’t know what’s going to happen. If the Israelis stop them, we know it’ll be brutal,” Wright said.

The brightly colored “Handala” carries activists from Italy, France, Norway, Australia, the Netherlands, Syria and a number of Palestinians. It has made several port calls around Scandinavia and the Mediterranean to raise awareness about the situation in Gaza.

Its hull carries slogans reading: “Free Palestine”, “Gaza you are not alone” and “Stop the Genocide”, while its humanitarian aid cargo consists mostly of medicines.

The trip along the Eastern Mediterranean to Gaza will take a week but organizers said they might stop over in another harbor on the way.

NOTE: The flotilla movement was begun by activists Greta Berlin, Paul Larudee and associates.

The ship named Handala, belonging to the Freedom Flotilla (Ship to Gaza), which set sail from the capital of Norway, Oslo, on May 1st with the aim of delivering humanitarian aid to Gaza arrives in Rotterdam, Netherlands on 25 May, 2024 [ Abdullah Asiran/Anadolu via Getty Images]
The ship named Handala, belonging to the Freedom Flotilla (Ship to Gaza), which set sail from the capital of Norway, Oslo, on May 1st with the aim of delivering humanitarian aid to Gaza arrives in Rotterdam, Netherlands on 25 May, 2024 [ Abdullah Asiran/Anadolu via Getty Images] (photo)
Israeli leaders strategize about how to dodge ICC arrest warrants

Andalou Agency reports: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant met with other officials Thursday to discuss efforts by the International Criminal Court (ICC) to issue arrest warrants against them.

“The Attorney General reiterated her position regarding the establishment of a State Commission of Inquiry to examine the humanitarian situation in Gaza even though, according to the view of the Attorney General herself, there is no certainty that establishing this commission would lead to the cancellation of the request to issue the warrants,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement.



‘From the river to the sea’: six words that are testing freedom of speech in Germany

The Guardian reports: Is it legal to say the words “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” in Germany? The answer appears to be yes: you can shout them from the rooftops in German, English, Arabic or Hebrew, so long as a court accepts that you are not doing so to indicate support for Hamas or its murderous assault of 7 October.

This distinction came to bear on the activist Ava Moayeri last week, when she was convicted of “condoning a crime” for leading a chant of the slogan at a Berlin rally on 11 October. If the speaker of the phrase is understood to mean, for instance, that they support the peaceful liberation of Palestinians, then the utterance would be protected.

But the presiding judge, Birgit Balzer, didn’t think that was possible in this case, citing the date of the protest in her decision. Moayeri is expected to challenge the verdict in a higher court.

The slogan has come to symbolize a rift running through German society amid Israel’s war in Gaza. For some people, the expression is implicitly genocidal, especially because of its long history of use by Hamas and other terrorist organizations. The judge reportedly said that it was clear to her that it “denied the right of the state of Israel to exist”, while Germany’s interior minister, Nancy Faeser, has declared it to be a Hamas slogan.

(Read the full article here.)



Student protesters at UC Irvine were suspended with no chance to defend themselves. Will courts return them to campus?

The Intercept reports: Amid the brutal police crackdowns at more than 100 campus protests against the war in Gaza the spring, one university in California stood out for its especially harsh treatment of student protesters. The school effectively eliminated any due process for the students by suspending them without making specific allegations of misconduct or allowing the students to respond to vague charges.

Last month, student protesters at University of California, Irvine sued the school regents and chancellor for suspending them without any notice or a chance to present evidence in their defense. On Tuesday, plaintiffs in the suit filed a motion to ask the Superior Court of California to step in.

The five students are asking the court to force the school to halt the suspensions and allow students to resume their studies, register for fall classes, go back to campus jobs, and regain access to campus housing.

More than 3,000 people were arrested during brutal police crackdowns on campus protests this year, according to a protest tracker developed by The Appeal. UCI is still an outlier — it’s one of the only schools in the country that issued interim suspensions banning students from campus before they had a chance to respond. The university’s approach was, a representative for the students said, unprecedented.

(Read the full article here.)

Are these people Hamas? Photo by Justin Tallis/AFP via Getty Images
Are these people Hamas? Photo by Justin Tallis/AFP via Getty Images (photo)
‘Not Another Bomb’ to Israel Demand Grows Ahead of Democratic Convention

Common Dreams reports: Leading up to the Democratic National Convention in Chicago next week, calls for the U.S. government to stop arming Israel’s devastating assault on the Gaza Strip—widely denounced around the world as genocide—continued to mount on Friday.

“We join the millions of people who’ve taken action the last 10 months, taxpayers who don’t want to pay for genocide and are demanding an immediate arms embargo on Israel,” U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights (USCPR) executive director Ahmad Abuznaid said in a statement Friday.

“We know that politicians won’t change their unjust policies until it’s in their own self-interest to do so,” he continued. “We must double down on our demands ahead of the DNC, where we’ll be marching in the streets for the liberation of all.”

Pro-Palestine protests in Chicago are set to start Sunday, a day before the DNC officially begins. They will continue throughout the week, according to a schedule shared Friday by the Chicago Sun-Times. The March on the DNC is planned for Monday afternoon.

(Read the full article here.)

NOTE: If Americans Knew has created fact sheets about Gaza that will be distributed at the protests shown above. IAK will also have a digital billboard truck in Chicago during the convention and large posters about Gaza will be plastered around the city.

Protesters in Atlanta, Georgia, demand a ceasefire in Gaza on June 27, 2024. Photo by Octavio Jones/Getty Images
Protesters in Atlanta, Georgia, demand a ceasefire in Gaza on June 27, 2024. Photo by Octavio Jones/Getty Images (photo)
New Poll Suggests Gaza Ceasefire and Arms Embargo Would Help Dems with Swing State Voters

A new poll, just released Wednesday by YouGov and the Institute for Mideast Understanding (IMEU) showed that in three key battleground states, “About a quarter of those surveyed across these states say the violence in Gaza will sway how they vote,” and that “60% or more disapprove of more weapons to Israel.”

Even more stunning, the number of Democratic and Independent voters who would be less likely to vote for Harris if she vowed to stop arming Israel is minuscule. In Pennsylvania, only 7% said they would be less likely to vote for Harris if she pledged to stop sending weapons to Israel; in both Arizona and Georgia, that figure was just 5%.

The gaps are huge. In those same states, the numbers saying they would be more likely to vote for Harris if she pledged to stop arming Israel were 34% in Pennsylvania, 39% in Georgia, and 35% in Arizona. The rest said it wouldn’t affect their vote.

“This polling clearly shows that if the Democrats want Vice President Harris to be the strongest nominee possible going into November, then they should be demanding that President Biden stop the flow of weapons to Israel and secure a permanent ceasefire immediately,” IMEU Policy Project Executive Director Margaret DeReus said in a statement. “Not only are these policies popular, but they actually move voters from the ‘undecided’ or ‘not voting’ column and into the Democrats’ column in the states Democrats will need to win.”

It is clear that the idea that forcing Israel into a ceasefire by withholding weapons would be beneficial to Harris, and all the more so if Israel then stops its genocide, and Iran and the rest of the Axis of Resistance stand down, as has been promised, and is the overwhelmingly likely result.

Harris leads Trump in Pennsylvania by 2.1%, Arizona by 0.7%, and Georgia by 0.1%, according to the data-driven news site FiveThirtyEight’s polling averages as of Aug. 14.

An Israeli soldier carries a 155mm artillery shell near a self-propelled howitzer deployed at a position near the border with Lebanon in the upper Galilee region of northern Israel on October 18, 2023. (Photo: Jalaa Marey/AFP via Getty Images)
An Israeli soldier carries a 155mm artillery shell near a self-propelled howitzer deployed at a position near the border with Lebanon in the upper Galilee region of northern Israel on October 18, 2023. (Photo: Jalaa Marey/AFP via Getty Images) (photo)
Senior diplomat resigns over UK’s complicity in ‘war crimes’ in Gaza

Middle East Monitor reports: A senior British diplomat has resigned from the Foreign Office over the UK’s continued arms sales to Israel, which he said have “no justification”.

Mark Smith, the head of Africa Programmes and Expertise Department and the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, submitted a resignation letter entitled “FCDO complicity in War Crimes” reports revealed yesterday.

“It is with sadness that I resign after a long career in the diplomatic service,” he wrote, “however I can no longer carry out my duties in the knowledge that this Department may be complicit in War Crimes. ”

“Each day we witness clear and unquestionable examples of War Crimes and breaches of International Humanitarian Law in Gaza perpetrated by the State of Israel,” he continued.

He went on to highlight how “senior members of the Israeli government and militar have expressed open genocidal intent, Isralei soldiers take videos, deliberately burning destroying, and looting civilian property and openly admit to the rape and torture of prisoners.”

Melbourne orchestra leaders voted out for removing pianist over Gaza tribute

Middle East Eye reports: Musicians at the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra (MSO) have passed a vote of no confidence in its board after it cancelled a show by a pianist who had dedicated a performance to Palestinian journalists killed by Israeli forces in Gaza.

In a letter to the management, the musicians said, “We believe it is the duty of senior management to lead and manage in accordance with the MSO’s values and behaviors, however, it has become apparent that these values no longer appear to be aligned with those of the orchestra and staff.”

On Sunday, British-Australian pianist Jayson Gillham premiered a five-minute piece called Witness, which he performed after a brief comment on Israel’s killing of journalists in Gaza, which he referred to as a war crime.

Following the concert, MSO announced that it had cancelled Gillham’s upcoming performance, which was to take place on Thursday, due to “a series of introductory remarks” he made.

It said that it had sought “independent security advice” following Sunday’s concert, and in light of the advice, “had no option but to cancel” Gillham’s next show.

AUSTRALIAN FINANCIAL REVIEW ADDS: After a litany of protest from its staff, some subscribers and members of the public, the MSO had by Thursday relented and released a statement admitting its cancellation of Gillham had been “an error”, and that it was working to program a new concert with him shortly.

The backdown has in turn upset some Jewish stakeholders.

“The MSO got it right the first time,” said the co-chief executive of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, Peter Wertheim.

Jayson Gillham has been involved in the Palestinian issue in the past.

“Blue Vote Red Line” movement continues to gather signatures

The “Blue Vote Red Line” movement seeks to collect 1 million voters to pledge a vote for the Democratic ticket if, and only if, it commits to 1) enforce an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, as ordered by the World Court and UN Security Council Resolution 2735 or 2) end all military aid to Israel.

Their goal is to “force the Democratic Party to listen to its voters and not just its donors. The pledge can be viewed and signed here.

MORE NEWS:

IMEMC Daily Reports.

BBC: ‘On verge of an explosion’: Policeman’s killing part of spiraling West Bank violence

The Cradle: Canada violates UN arms treaty with ‘unofficial’ shipments to Israel via US

DropSite News: While Elon Musk battles the UK and EU over social media censorship, Israel is jailing citizens for Instagram posts

Palestine Chronicle: Deceptive Optimism – What is really happening at the Gaza ceasefire talks (analysis)


STATISTICS OCTOBER 7 – AUGUST 16:

Palestinian death toll from October 7 – August 16: at least 40,706* (40,074 in Gaza* – 11,445 women (30%), 16,251 children as of July 22. [The Ministry’s figures have been contested by the Israeli authorities, although they have been accepted as accurate by Israeli intelligence services, the UN, and WHO. These data are supported by independent analyses, comparing changes in the number of deaths of UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) staff with those reported by the Ministry, which found claims of data fabrication implausible.]

This is expected to be a significant undercount since thousands of those killed have yet to be identified – and at least 632 in the West Bank (~145 children). This does not include an estimated 10,000 more still buried under rubble (4,900 women and children). Euro-Med Monitor reports 46,848 Palestinian deaths.

Lancet: “Applying a conservative estimate of four indirect deaths per one direct death9 to the 37,396 deaths reported, it is not implausible to estimate that up to 186 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza.

Ralph Nader earlier estimated 200,000 Palestinians may have been killed in Gaza.

At least 45 Palestinians have died in Israeli prisons (27 from Gaza, 18 from West Bank).
At least 41 Palestinians have died due to malnutrition**.
About 1.9 million of Gaza’s 2.3 million population are currently displaced.
Almost 500,000 Gazans are currently experiencing catastrophic levels of food insecurity.
Palestinian injuries from October 7 – August 16: at least 97,957 (including at least 92,537 in Gaza and 5,420 in the West Bank, including 830 children). [It remains unknown how man Americans are among the casualties in Gaza.]

Reported Israeli death toll from October 7 – August 16: ~1,454 (~1,139 on October 7, 2023, of which ~32 were Americans, and ~36 were children); 290*** military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza; 25 military and civilians in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Israel) and~10,000 injured.

NOTE: It is unknown at this time how many of the deaths and injuries in Israel on October 7 were caused by Israeli soldiers.

*Previously, IAK did not include 471 Gazans killed in the Al Ahli hospital blast since the source of the projectile was being disputed. However, given that much evidence points to Israel as the culprit, Israel had previously bombed the hospital and has attacked many others, Israel is prohibiting outside experts from investigating the scene, and since the UN and other agencies are including the deaths from the attack in their cumulative totals, if Americans knew is now also doing so.

**Euro-Med Monitor reports that Gaza’s elderly are dying at an alarmingly high rate. The majority die at home and are buried either close to their residences or in makeshift graves dispersed across the Strip. There are currently more than 140 such cemeteries. Additionally, according to Euromed, thousands have died from starvation, malnourishment, and inadequate medical care; these are considered indirect victims as they were not registered in hospitals.

***Approximately ten of the deaths listed above were Israeli soldiers killed by Hezbollah in fighting at the Israel-Lebanon border. The figure does not include the reportedly 41 Israeli soldiers – nearly 16% of the total Israeli military deaths – killed due to friendly fire in Gaza and other military-related accidents.

† For most of the conflict, women and children accounted for about 70% of deaths in Gaza, with children making up a little over 40% of those killed, according to official statistics.

Find previous daily casualty figures and daily news updates here.

Hover over each bar for exact numbers.
Source: IsraelPalestineTimeline.org
Human rights reports on Israel-Palestine (regularly updated)
Understanding what motivates ultra-orthodox Jewish attacks on West Bank Palestinians
Palestinians’ harrowing stories of rape by Israeli soldiers (including female soldiers)
A Palestinian journalist visited Ismail Haniyeh’s home in Gaza to report on his death. Israel assassinated him too.
I reported a piece for the New York Times on antisemitism. I found a major error, but the Times didn’t care.
How Israel plans to whitewash its war crimes in Gaza
Why the West Bank is on the verge of economic collapse
Netanyahu’s plan to involve US in regional war on its behalf
Western media continue to withhold the truth about Israel and Gaza – 4 stories
“Well What SHOULD Israel Have Done After October 7?”
Welcome to Hell
More dead children. More BBC ‘news’ channelling Israeli propaganda as its own
U.S. media downplays and ignores ICJ ruling declaring Israeli occupation illegal
Israeli soldiers tell story of savage cruelty in Gaza – one given blessing by the West
Searching for Gaza’s missing children
What Would You Do With An Extra $320 Million?
Assassination of Haniyeh an intentional, dangerous escalation – Parsi, Macgregor
When Israel Burned Refugees Alive, Establishment Media Called It a ‘Tragic Accident’
Israel has turbocharged West Bank housing demolitions under the cover of war
Western media ignores Israeli confirmation of Hannibal Directive on 7 Oct
US Should Arrest Benjamin Netanyahu When He’s in Washington
Airwars investigation: Israeli airstrikes uniquely lethal (video)
Hesen Jabr paid the price of conscience
Gaza genocide denial
Why the news media’s job is to groom us
‘Disappeared, buried, detained’: The horrors of Gaza’s missing children

https://israelpalestinenews.org/gaza-records-first-polio-case-in-25-years-day-314/

The False Flag Trump Shooting
Kevin Barrett, Senior EditorJuly 21, 2024

VT Condemns the ETHNIC CLEANSING OF PALESTINIANS by USA/Israel

$ 280 BILLION US TAXPAYER DOLLARS INVESTED since 1948 in US/Israeli Ethnic Cleansing and Occupation Operation; $ 150B direct "aid" and $ 130B in "Offense" contracts
Source: Embassy of Israel, Washington, D.C. and US Department of State.

by VT Editor Kevin Barrett via Substack

When a violent, shocking, spectacular American-history-turning event occurs—examples include the sinking of the USS Maine and Lusitania, the attacks on US ships at Pearl Harbor or the Gulf of Tonkin, the Kennedy assassinations, and 9/11—history teaches us that things are seldom what they seem. All of those incidents, and more, were deceptions orchestrated by forces that stood to benefit. The schoolbook narratives of all of these events, and many more, are lies.

The key that unlocks the truth is the Latin phrase cui bono: who benefits? In all of the above cases, a powerful faction that wanted war—call it the war party—orchestrated deceptions that enabled the wars they wanted.

Does the alleged shooting of Donald Trump last Saturday fit that pattern? Like the others, it was a spectacular act of violence that, in retrospect, is likely be seen as history-changing:

“The election is likely to be a landslide. This probably reduces uncertainty,” said Nick Ferres, chief investment officer at Vantage Point Asset Management, citing polls that showed a surge in support for Reagan after the attempt on his life.

The weak counter-argument admits that the shooting significantly improved Trump’s odds, but those odds are not 100% since “nothing is set in stone.”

The long and short of it is that those who want a second Trump presidency were the obvious beneficiaries of an apparently random event that, were it a PR stunt, would have been worth hundreds of millions of dollars to the Trump campaign. The iconic photo of Trump fending off the Secret Service agents tasked with whisking him away ASAP and shaking his fist defiantly as he yells “fight! fight! fight!” could not have been more perfectly scripted. Reality TV actor Trump has never been more in his element.



Nor could the shooting have been more perfectly timed. It occurred at the ideal moment to interrupt the news cycle that was about to force Biden to step down in favor of a stronger Democratic candidate. And it happened in the best possible time-frame for energizing the Republican base—and taking the wind out of the anti-Trump media’s sails—just ahead of the Republican convention, which became a spectacularly unanimous coronation-by-acclamation.

The “shot that winged Trump’s ear” was even luckier for Trump than for the world’s-worst-marksman who allegedly took it. Most obviously, it gave Trump some blood for the photo op. It also gave him the opportunity to put on an ear bandage that served as a sort of purple heart, or rather a white badge of courage, at the convention. If billion-to-one odds had not been defied, and the world’s-worst-marksman had just plain missed—or, vastly more likely, never been allowed to get off a shot—the whole thing would have fizzled and been forgotten, like the failed attempt against RFK Jr. last September. Indeed, of all human beings throughout all of recorded history, Trump may have been “the luckiest to have gotten shot.” Had he “turned his head at the wrong moment such that the bullet completely missed” he would face much better odds of spending the rest of his life in the big house rather than the White House…or of being actually assassinated, presumably by efficient and deniable means.

Indeed, the “shot in the ear” was like another kind of shot we have been hearing a lot about—an inoculation shot. It inoculated Trump against further assassination attempts, including the professional kind that rarely miss. Prior to his miraculously lucky ear shot, Trump was vulnerable to being taken out by any of a long list of deniable methods available to his deep state enemies. They could have laced one of his diet cokes with an untraceable heart attack agent, poisoned his toothbrush as happened to J. Edgar Hoover, or had him shot in such a way as to keep him out of the White House rather than to put him in it. But in the wake of the “lucky ear shot” and apparent Secret Service breakdown that enabled it, if anything happens to Trump, his base will burn down the country. That ear shot quite likely saved Trump’s life, not to mention his political career.

That the first serious amateur attempt on Trump’s life actually got off shots, and—mirabile dictu—winged his ear, providing hundreds of millions if not billions of dollars worth of PR for the Trump campaign, proves that Yahweh, or his agents, must have had a hand in it. On the assumption that Yahweh delegated the job to his agents, rather than just rolling up his sleeves and doing it himself, the question arises: “How did Yahweh’s agents manage to pull it off?”

Some of my excitable friends will no doubt exclaim: “It was all done with crisis actors! Nobody really got hurt or killed!” They will troll the web for photographs that faintly resemble the gunman and his victim, point out that they are still alive, and claim they have proved that the whole thing was a hoax. Alternately, they will dig into birth, death, and social security records, as well as social and mainstream media, and claim that whatever they find isn’t enough to support the presumption that Thomas Matthew Crooks, Corey Comperatore (who died from a gunshot at the rally) and “a 57-year-old New Kensington, Pennsylvania, resident and a 74-year-old resident of Moon Township” ever existed.

These are the people who insist that no planes hit the World Trade Center and that most or all of the 9/11 victims never existed. They think nobody really got hurt at the Boston bombing or the Las Vegas shooting or Sandy Hook. It’s all crisis actors, they say. False flaggers who stage violent events actually hate real violence, so they fake as much of it as possible…sometimes all of it.

I am, to say the least, not convinced by those arguments. My study of spectacular, spectacularly deceptive deep state events suggests that the perpetrators generally manipulate perceptions of actual violent events, rather than simply staging fake ones. (The violent events, of course, are generally orchestrated or steered by the perpetrators.)

If I were one of Yahweh’s agents…

If I were a high-ranking member of the deep state who wanted a second Trump term, here’s how I would have done it.

Get the necessary personnel on board. After looking at the extensive files on all relevant personnel, from Trump himself to Secret Service people to potential patsies, I would know who to approach and how to approach them. Here’s how I might approach Trump: “Don, the deep state faction that despises you currently has about an 80% chance of success, defined as keeping you out of the White House by either killing or disabling you or winning/rigging the election. The odds that you end up dead or in prison by the end of 2024 are over 60%. We need to significantly move the dial on those odds. There’s only one way to do it: You need to be ‘wounded’ in an assassination attempt that generates a spectacular, iconic photo, and riles up your base to the point that the Never Trumpers avoid taking you out for real.” “Gosh, Kevin…didn’t Nixon once say ‘that would be wrong’”? “Don, your enemies are absolutely ruthless. We have to be ruthless too. So here’s the deal: A lone nut who couldn’t hit the side of a barn is going to fire a few shots at a Trump rally, and one of them is going to supposedly ‘clip your ear.’ You’re going to flinch at the first shot, reach for your ear, hit the deck, and let one of our guys mess with that ear so that when you stand up, there’s blood. You’re going to take command as they try to drag you off, shake your fist, and say ‘fight fight fight.’ Can you remember those lines?” “Roger.” “And don’t worry about how you’re going to look when the first shot rings out, because you’ll know real bullets are flying so you won’t have to do much method acting.” (Then the same basic approach is used on anyone else who needs-to-know. Obviously, only people whose files reveal them to be strongly pro-Trump and ethically flexible are approached. If Trump, based on his files, is not ethically flexible enough to go along with a shooting that will likely hurt or kill one or two of his supporters, he’s told nobody will get hurt…and if and when he learns otherwise after the event, it will be too late. And if Trump is so ethically inflexible that he won’t do a fake shooting at all, which seems ridiculously unlikely, we’ll keep him out of the loop and find a way to shoot his ear with a BB or something from close range at the moment the first shot rings out.)
Recruit a shooter who is a poor marksman from the MK-Ultra contingent. For extra insurance, give him a rifle with a bad sight. Stage a “Secret Service screw-up” to get him on roof and give him time to squeeze off several fruitless shots. (The odds that one of those random shots would actually kill or disable Trump are very low—vastly lower than the 60% odds Trump ends up dead or in prison by the end of the year if he doesn’t take the risk.)
Look for places to hold Trump rallies with suitable buildings nearby.Set up contingency plans for three or four possible locations, like JFK’s killers did by having plans in place for Miami (canceled), Dallas (successful), and Chicago (unnecessary), according to James Douglass.
Count on mainstream media’s distaste for “conspiracy theories”—and be ready to enforce it. Normally a plan like this would seem risky or impossible, because much of the media hates Trump and would love to destroy him by exposing his or his supporters’ crimes. But there are crimes, and there are crimes. Two-bit crimes like 30-year-old he-said-she-said alleged sexual assaults, paperwork screw-ups, and so on are fair game for media and prosecutors. But massive, horrifying political crimes are routinely covered up by media due to the taboo against “conspiracy theories.” So the odds that significant, influential mainstream media will expose the false flag are very low, and can be made lower by scouring the personnel files of all relevant figures in advance and being prepared to stop them if necessary, as was done to Paul Wellstone and Hunter Thompson after 9/11, and many dozens of JFK witnesses and journalists in the wake of the 1963 coup.
But would the deep state even want a second Trump presidency?

In the past, it has always been the war party that orchestrates this kind of deception. The Maine greased the skids for the Spanish-American war. The Lusitania greased the skids for US entry into World War I. Pearl Harbor singlehandedly enabled US entry into World War II, by flipping the massive anti-war majority into an equally massive pro-war one. The Gulf of Tonkin incident hugely escalated US involvement in Vietnam. 9/11 unleashed a series of wars for Israel that cost $7 trillion and killed millions of people.

Interestingly, the JFK assassination, which led to both escalation in Vietnam and (more importantly) US support for Israel’s 1967 war of aggression, was not the only time that a US president has been inserted, by murderous deception, to enable war. The 1940 Republican convention was rigged, after the murder of the convention manager, to ensure that pro-war unknown Wendell Wilkie, rather than any of the other more plausible candidates (who were all antiwar) emerged as the candidate. Since any antiwar Republican would have easily beaten Roosevelt, the murderous insertion of Wilkie was a necessary step towards US involvement in World War II. (The story is entertainingly recounted in Gore Vidal’s The Golden Age.)

But Trump?! He and his vice presidential candidate, J.D. Vance, are skeptical about Biden’s war on Ukraine. Isn’t Trump the peace candidate?

In a word, no. Trump’s first term was a war presidency, even more than Obama’s. The Trump team: *Armed Ukraine to the teeth and flooded it with NATO advisors, setting the stage for the current war. *Assassinated Iran’s General Soleimani, a shoo-in to win that nation’s presidency, thereby almost setting off World War III. *Ratcheted up the covert US war on China, in part by attacking China with the COVID-19 anti-economy bioweapon. *Refused to withdraw from Afghanistan. *Refused to withdraw from Iraq and Syria despite demands from both governments. *Massively increased military spending. *Declared World War III against the world’s nearly two billion Muslims by approving Israel’s theft of territory, moving the US embassy to Jerusalem, and generally obeying Netanyahu’s every order, setting the stage for the current genocidal war.

If the deep state wants to cut its losses and shift the war front from Russia to China and/or Iran, Trump is the man to do it. Trump is surrounded by fanatics who, like the soon-to-be-pardoned Steve Bannon, believe it is the US’s destiny to defeat China in a hot war. And he is even more surrounded by even crazier fanatics who want to blow up the world in general, and Iran and its allies in particular, on behalf of the looniest wing of the Zionist genocide project.

With a Democrat in the White House, Netanyahu has no hope of “finishing the job” of the genocide of Palestine. The massacre of a few million Palestinians, and expulsion of millions more, could only happen under the “fog of war” of an all-out US-and-Israel vs. Axis of Resistance confrontation. And that’s what Netanyahu has devoted his entire political career to engineering. He won’t get it without another Trump presidency.

Regardless of the details, whether it involves turning Taiwan into China’s Ukraine, or joining Israel’s campaign against West Asia, America can’t mobilize for all-out war with a Democrat in the White House. Only a chest-thumping macho leader like Trump can infuse America’s fighting men (not women, sorry) with the necessary testosterone-fueled enthusiasm. Nobody with fighting spirit is going to sign up for Biden’s rainbow-flag-waving bisexual army. But Trump’s base will flock like lemmings to fight and die for the Orangeman waving the red-white-and-blue. So if you want war, big-time, you need Trump in the White House. End of story.

Please convince me I’m wrong!

I wish I were wrong about all of this. I wish Mike King, whose view of Trump almost rivals Q Anon’s, were right. I wish Trump were a real America First candidate, rather than an actor who plays one on reality TV. I wish he were the savior America needs, rather than a false messiah. I wish the “magic ear shot” were a real miracle from the universal God (as opposed to the bloodthirsty tribal idol Yahweh) whose purpose was to put a peace candidate in the White House.

So go ahead, try to convince me. I want to believe you. Explain to me, in detail, why logic and evidence proves that the “magic ear shot” could not possibly have been orchestrated in the way I am suggesting, or another roughly similar way.

I want to believe you. But the onus—the burden of proof—is on you. Given the historical context, we must assume that the “magic ear shot” event was an orchestrated deception, like its historical precedents, unless there is slam-dunk proof to the contrary. So please, drop that slam-dunk proof in the comments section! If you convince me, it will really cheer me up ; – )



Dr. Kevin Barrett, a Ph.D. Arabist-Islamologist is one of America’s best-known critics of the War on Terror.

He is the host of TRUTH JIHAD RADIO; a hard-driving weekly radio show funded by listener subscriptions at Substack and the weekly news roundup FALSE FLAG WEEKLY NEWS (FFWN).

He also has appeared many times on Fox, CNN, PBS, and other broadcast outlets, and has inspired feature stories and op-eds in the New York Times, the Christian Science Monitor, the Chicago Tribune, and other leading publications.

Dr. Barrett has taught at colleges and universities in San Francisco, Paris, and Wisconsin; where he ran for Congress in 2008. He currently works as a nonprofit organizer, author, and talk radio host.

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www.truthjihad.com

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https://www.vtforeignpolicy.com/2024/07/the-false-flag-trump-shooting/

Ziopocalypse Now!
Kevin Barrett, Senior EditorAugust 13, 2024

VT Condemns the ETHNIC CLEANSING OF PALESTINIANS by USA/Israel

$ 280 BILLION US TAXPAYER DOLLARS INVESTED since 1948 in US/Israeli Ethnic Cleansing and Occupation Operation; $ 150B direct "aid" and $ 130B in "Offense" contracts
Source: Embassy of Israel, Washington, D.C. and US Department of State.



Rumble link Bitchute link False Flag Weekly News link

By Kevin Barrett via Substack

Francis Ford Coppola’s 1979 film Apocalypse Now re-sets Joseph Conrad’s novella Heart of Darkness in Vietnam, and re-envisions the protagonist’s mission as one of ritual murder. In both versions, the antagonist, Kurtz, has gone mad, exceeding the purported savagery of the savages and becoming a threat to the thin veneer of lies and hypocrisy that protect the illusion of Western civilizational superiority. Kurtz’s last words in the novel, “exterminate all the brutes!” become in the film “drop the bomb! Exterminate them all!”

Today, a real-life analogue of Kurtz, Bezalel Smotrich, has been calling for the murder of all Gazans by forced mass starvation while his fellow government minister, Eliyahu, prefers nuclear weapons. Another Kurtzlike figure, Benyamin Netanyahu, is steering Israeli policy in that direction. And most of the Zionist public concurs. By official counts they have murdered around 40,000 Gazans, the majority women and children. But when indirect deaths caused by deliberate deprivation of food and destruction of infrastructure are taken into account the real figure rises to around 200,000.

Polls have shown that almost all Jewish Israelis support the genocide. “Right to rape” protesters have been storming military bases to ensure that their preferred policy is carried out. Sodom, thy name is Israel!

“Drop the bomb! Exterminate them all!” perfectly summarizes Israel’s genocidal lunacy. It also neatly encapsulates the Samson Option, Israel’s plan to vaporize all major European and West Asian cities with nuclear weapons if its existence as a genocidal settler colony is ever seriously threatened.

If Conrad’s Kurtz is a lunatic whose acting out exposes the savagery of the so-called civilization that sent him, the same can be said of the Zionists. It isn’t that they have “gone native” and started “acting like Arabs,” any more than Kurtz “went native” and started “acting like Congolese” (or, in the film, Vietnamese). In all cases, it is the Western colonizer, not the colonized, who is the real savage. It is the Western colonizer who has invaded someone else’s territory and brutalized them into submission. But in order to do that, the colonizer has to convince himself that he is the civilized one, and his victim the barbarian. In other words, he has to lie.

Conrad’s novella exposes the lies about Leopold’s rape of the Congo, a “civilizing mission” that amounted to one of the most brutal atrocity exhibitions in the sorry history of humanity. Coppola’s film similarly targets the lies that sought to justify the US war on Vietnam. Both stories portray Kurtz as a monster whose mask has slipped, exposing Western savagery.

Though the Belgians and Americans were quite capable of spinning outrageous untruths to protect their barbaric expeditions of rapine and pillage, the Zionists have taken lying to a whole new level. Incredibly, they cast Hamas’s al Aqsa Storm raid—a skillful military operation carried out with great restraint and little surplus cruelty—as a “new Holocaust.” Lunatic sadomasochistic fantasies, those staples of the Zionist imagination, were fleshed out into transparently ridiculous tales of roasted babies and mass rape.

In reality, it is the Zionists, not the Palestinians, who harbor perverse desires to roast and eat enemy babies and perform mass rapes. Every ludicrous accusation amounts to a confession.

Whence such perversity? Central to Jewish culture is an extreme fear and loathing of the non-Jewish enemy. It’s a truism that every Jewish holiday is the same: “They tried to kill us. We won. Let’s eat.” But at some level, Jews know that Biblical tales of the villainy of Egyptians, Persians, Philistines, Romans, and other tribal enemies are sheer mythology—tribal propaganda lies designed to unite Jews in hatred of the non-Jewish other. Pretending to accept such lies, while secretly acknowledging their mendacity, has, over 2500 years, become a Jewish tribal shibboleth. It continues today, in slightly different form, with even more outrageous lies about their modern tribal enemies: Germans, Arabs, and Muslims. Every Jew knows deep down that the canonical version of the Holocaust is likely a gross exaggeration, and that the Jewish versions of the triumph of Zionists over the Arabs and Muslims (and indeed the West) are outrageous distortions of historical reality.

They know they’re lying. But they don’t care. That institutionalization of collective pathological mendacity has pernicious psychological effects. For starters, it induces deep-seated self-hatred. (We are hard-wired to hate liars, including ourselves when we lie, which is why lying causes anxiety whose signs can be picked up by lie detectors.)

Tribal Jews know they are liars, hate themselves for it, and grow consumed by the desperate need to unload their self-hatred on somebody else. So, encouraged by psychopathic leadership, they project their self-loathing on a designated tribal enemy. Yesterday it was the Germans who “must perish.” Today it is the “Hamas terrorists” who need to be starved and/or nuked. Why? Because Jews have dreamed up all manner of phantasmagoric atrocities, including more than a few that they themselves dream of inflicting, and projected them on an enemy targeted for genocidal annihilation.

Today, in the tenth month of the genocidal onslaught on Gaza, the mask has slipped from the face of the Zionist Kurtz, revealing “the horror” of the whole Zionist project. It’s an apocalypse in the etymological sense of a revelation or unveiling. And the horrific revealed truth threatens to undermine the foundations of Western civilization, that “garden” that supposedly compares so favorably with the non-Western “jungle.” All of the West’s pious platitudes about human rights and the rule of law have been exposed as heaps of rank, steaming bullshit, since Western governments continue to tolerate and in many cases actively support the genocide of Gaza.

The Gaza genocide is turning the whole non-Western world against the West. Today, few outside the West would shed tears if Russia managed to detonate several of its radioactive tidal wave weapons and drown the most populous parts of America and Europe under sizzling seawater, rendering those areas permanently uninhabitable. Many would view such a gratuitous act of desolation as an improvement over the current state of things, i.e. rule by genocidal lunatics. And though Russia is unlikely to take such a step, except perhaps under the most extreme duress, technologies of mass destruction continue to emerge, potentially putting civilization-ending powers into a great many hands.

Even short of a WMD apocalypse, the non-Western world, galvanized against the West by the Gaza genocide, will likely get its revenge one way or another. As Western power wanes, todays rulers will be tomorrows ruled, and they should not expect more mercy than what they have been showing to the women and children of Gaza. Doris Lessing’s novel Shikasta, which depicts a near future world dominated by China and its Global South allies who deliberately starve much of the Western population, may not be as unrealistic as it appeared when it came out in 1979.

So it is in the West’s interest to “terminate Zionism’s command” in Palestine “with extreme prejudice,” just as it was in the Belgians’ and Americans’ interest to terminate Kurtz’s command. After all, Zionism’s methods—genocide, pathological lying, systematic torture and mass anal rape among them—are unsound. The Zionist Kurtz has gone mad. Someone needs to be sent to take him out.

But how? Does the US have a Captain Willard (Martin Sheen) character who can make his way to Netanyahu’s residence and butcher the Israeli war criminal with a machete while Jim Morrison croons “this is the end” on the soundtrack?

As appealing as the thought of taking a machete to Netanyahu may be, simply terminating the Zionist butcher boss with extreme prejudice wouldn’t solve the problem. Adding Smotrich and Ben Gvir might be even more satisfying, but no more efficacious. As we’ve seen, essentially all of Israeli Jewry is genocidal. They all need to be removed from Palestine.

Fortunately it won’t be that hard to persuade them to leave. Well over a million Jewish Israelis have second passports, even more want them, and once the exodus starts the rest won’t be far behind. A combination of military defeat and domestic unrest (civil war between those who support raping detainees and those who are embarrassed by it?) will ensure that the proverbial writing is on the wall.

So the West’s Martin Sheen character will have a more complex assignment than just terminating Bibi (played by Marlon Brando) with extreme prejudice. He’ll need to infiltrate the Zionist entity and stoke civil unrest, while conning the Zionists into launching a war they can’t win.

And maybe that’s what the Biden Administration is already doing, albeit unintentionally. Though Western leaders claim they will come to Israel’s defense whenever necessary, future historians may wonder whether that wasn’t a clever ruse designed to lead the Zionists down the road to perdition. The best way to teach a dog not to chase cars is to let him catch one; likewise the best way to teach Netanyahu to stop trying to provoke a regional war may be to let him provoke one—and eat the consequences.

Once Israel learns that it is facing an opponent with escalation dominance, and that the US umbrella has been withdrawn under duress, the Zionist rats will flee the sinking ship even faster than the pieds noirs left formerly French Algeria in 1962. The notion that committing ever-more abominations can force God to send them an anti-Christ messiah to miraculously subjugate their enemies while quaffing bottomless blood sacrifices from a “rebuilt” temple will be exposed as the laughable lunacy it always was. The messianic millenarian apocalyptic cult of Zionism will dry up and blow away. And on the increasingly infrequent occasions it is remembered, people will sigh and mutter:

“The horror! The horror!”



Dr. Kevin Barrett, a Ph.D. Arabist-Islamologist is one of America’s best-known critics of the War on Terror.

He is the host of TRUTH JIHAD RADIO; a hard-driving weekly radio show funded by listener subscriptions at Substack and the weekly news roundup FALSE FLAG WEEKLY NEWS (FFWN).

He also has appeared many times on Fox, CNN, PBS, and other broadcast outlets, and has inspired feature stories and op-eds in the New York Times, the Christian Science Monitor, the Chicago Tribune, and other leading publications.

Dr. Barrett has taught at colleges and universities in San Francisco, Paris, and Wisconsin; where he ran for Congress in 2008. He currently works as a nonprofit organizer, author, and talk radio host.

Archived Articles (2004-2016)

www.truthjihad.com

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https://www.vtforeignpolicy.com/2024/08/ziopocalypse-now/

Russia Slaying Khazarian Mafia in Ukraine
Jonas E. Alexis, Senior EditorOctober 12, 2022
First published 4 March 2022

JEA: The Washington Post has been shocked because Russia has blocked many of its citizens from accessing media outlets such as BBC and Facebook! These people have got to be kidding. Should that really be a big problem for the entire Zionist media and oligarchic institutions in much of the West? Don’t those outlets have a history of blocking things they don’t like as well? Do these people forget history that easily? Don’t they remember Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, and Libya?

The last time I checked, Facebook has blocked VT. The last time I checked, BBC was perpetuating anti-Russian propaganda with respect to what is happening in Ukraine. The last time I checked, it was a BBC journalist who asked Vladimir Putin a completely dumb question with respect to what was happening in the world. Putin, thank God, humiliated the poor fellow.

The BBC has recently reported that Russia “has launched a devastating attack on Ukraine, a European democracy of 44 million people,”[1] without mentioning a single word about what NATO has been doing for the past thirty years so!

It is even more disturbing when the BBC has put out articles such as “Why is Russia invading Ukraine and what does Putin want?” without even discussing the deep things that make up the crisis in the region. The article mentioned two things about NATO. The first one is this:

“Russia has long resisted Ukraine’s move towards the European Union and the West’s defensive military alliance, Nato. Announcing Russia’s invasion, he accused Nato of threatening ‘our historic future as a nation.’”

Really? That’s all there is to it? How stupid can we be? And then this: “There is no immediate threat to Russia’s Baltic neighbors, but Nato has bolstered their defences just in case.”

To understand the lunacy of the BBC statement, imagine some Chinese or North Korean warships circulating around the coast of California or Florida. Wouldn’t the United States eventually declare war if the Chinese or North Koreans leaders don’t immediately remove their warships?

Well, NATO has been circulating its troops around the Russian periphery for over a decade! And this has been in violation of international law. This is not some kind of conspiracy theory dreamed up by writers at VT. Scholars of all stripes have been saying this for years. John J. Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago, for example, has been writing about this since 2014. Mearsheimer in particular has recently reformulated that thesis in the New Yorker.

In any event, the BBC article did suggest something which Brother Nathanael Kapner will discuss below. The BBC seemed to suggest that Putin is in a war with the Khazarian Mafia in the region: “There has been no genocide in Ukraine: it is a vibrant democracy, led by a president who is Jewish.”

Now we’re talking.



…by Nathanael Kapner

The blitz on Russia is unhinged. It’s a study in ‘moronology.’

When US liquor stores are told by hacks to dump their already-bought Russian vodka, you know Russophobia is just a psychotic shot away. They dropped COVID just for this.

And when Fox News says ‘Putin is the Antichrist’ you know that whoever squawks the loudest gains the ear of lamebrain Americans. Rev up the heart rate.

Don’t you need somebody to hate. Today Putin, yesterday Sadaam, tomorrow whoever stands in the way of the Khazarian Mafia.

Ukraine is just a pawn in the Khazarian Mafia’s game to ‘contain’ Christian Russia.

With joint efforts of the Mossad and CIA clandestinely funding Ukraine’s nationalists—”Natz”—as the locals call them, short for “Nazis,” a Ukrainian deep state was created.

These “Natz” are descendants of the “Banderites” of World War II fame, with whom Hitler, due to their fanatical viciousness, shunned.

With the help of US State Departments’ Jew, Victoria Nuland, (born “Nudelman”), the Banderites executed a coup in 2014.

Straightaway an American puppet, known affectionately by Nudelman as “Yats,” a fellow Jew, was installed.

Today’s neo-Banderite battalions, fueled by manic hatred of anything “Russian,” got the lion’s share of military aid from the Khazarian Mafia in America that bolstered them for future attacks on Donbas then ultimately on Russia.

And with military bases, run by Nato and funded by international Jewish banks—achieving lethal pressure on Russia’s western flank—Putin protested of being squeezed.

Today, via surgical attacks on Ukraine’s military infrastructure, not civilian, Russia now controls all Ukrainian airspace.

One complex, a Nato/US Naval Base in Ochakov, masqueraded as a Ukrainian Naval Base between Odessa and Crimea, was just annihilated by the Russian Air Force.

So far Russia has hit some 1,500 Ukrainian military targets.

Thus “demilitarizing” covert Nato bases and their manic Banderite stooges.

The Russian bear will maul his way all the way west of Kyiv. Creating a line of demarcation as “peacemaking endgame,” the bear will split Ukraine in two.

What’s left of the “Natz”—most will be zapped—will be contained in a sequestered administrative zone bordering the EU.

The greater eastern portion with its new government will sign a non-alignment agreement with Russia under the umbrella of a Russian protectorate.

Let me pose a Jewish kind of question: Do those “Natz” hate Jews?

No, not at all.

But they love their Jewish Ukrainian oligarch enablers.

Jews like Ihor Kolomoyskyi, Oleksandr Yaroslavsky, and Zvi Hirsch—who changed his name, like many Jews do—to Gennadiy Boholyubov.

All of these oligarchs have lineages that can be traced to Jewish Bolshevik families

The same families that financed the overthrow of Czarist Christian Russia and the Christian monarchy of Nicholas II.

Yes, Putin’s calling for the denazification and demilitarization of Ukraine. He’s calling for its “de-communization” too.

”As a result of Bolshevik policy Soviet Ukraine arose which even today can with good reason be called ‘Vladimir Ilyich Lenin’s Ukraine.’ He is its author and architect. This is fully confirmed by archive documents also including Lenin’s decrees regarding adding the Donbass to Ukraine. And now grateful descendants have demolished monuments to Lenin in Ukraine. This is what they call de-communization. Do you want de-communization? Well, that suits us just fine. But why stop halfway? We are ready to show you what real de-communization means for Ukraine.”

A two-fold blow:

1) Purging the corrupt Jewish Ukrainian oligarchs who will be forced to flee just as they did when Putin purged them in Russia in 2003.

2) Purging the Ukrainian Parliament infested with Jews like Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal, Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov, and Culture and Information Policy Minister Oleksandr Tkachenko, all Jews.

Zelensky, the Jew President of Ukraine, by asking Nato for a no-fly zone to shoot down Russian planes—which the Khazarian Mafia in America rejected—shot himself in the foot for any bid for bargaining chips in talks with Putin.

Concerning the Rothschild/US Jewish FED cutting off Russia from financial markets and interbank payments, this is nothing less than assisted-suicide.

Russia and China long ago set up their own “SWIFT” interbank payment systems.

Nations needing Russian wheat, fertilizer, steel, aluminum, and oil, will pay not in dollars but in Chinese yuans that’s increasingly rising as the reserve currency replacing the dollar.

Once the Khazarian dollar (I mean, with no “productive” value) takes a dive, buying your jeans at Walmart will be like shopping at Nieman-Marcus on steroids.

Poking the Russian Bear has always been a Khazarian affair.

Curl up, they say, in a fetal position, when faced with a charging bear.

The bear is striking back and the Khazarians don’t have a prayer.

First published on March 4, 2022.



[1] Paul Kirby, “Why is Russia invading Ukraine and what does Putin want?,” BBC, March 4, 2022.

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https://veteranstoday.com/2022/10/12/russia-is-slaying-the-khazarian-mafia-in-ukraine/

As Gazans starve, Israeli rhetoric grows more and more radically anti-Palestinian – Day 306
[email protected] August 9, 2024 AIPAC, ceasefire, Cori Bush, ethnic cleansing, humanitarian aid gaza, kamala harris on palestine, polio in gaza, rape of palestinian prisoners, sanctions, tim walz on palestine, torture of Palestinian prisoners
A Palestinian girl clings to her mother in Gaza City, June 2 [Dawoud Abo Alkas/Anadolu] (photo)
In Gaza, airstrikes continue, food rations drop, polio threat grows; in Israel, calls to punish not the rapists, but the one who filmed them, to make rape of Palestinian prisoners official policy, to make Nablus in West Bank “look like Rafah,” to legalize Israeli settlement in Gaza, to end US sanctions on violent settlers; Biden administration ok’s more war after prisoner swap (risking ceasefire deal), condemns not AIPAC’s purchase of congressional candidates, but Cori Bush’s warnings against AIPAC; Kamala Harris indicates no tolerance for pro-Palestinian protesters or their message; Tim Walz’s track record on Palestine is not nearly as moral as Dems painted it; more.

By IAK staff, from reports.

At least 15 killed in Israeli bombing of two Gaza schools

The New Arab reports: An Israeli attack on two schools in Gaza City left at least 15 people killed and dozens injured in the Tuffah district of the besieged enclave.

The schools targeted, Abdel Fattah Hamoud and al-Zahraa, were destroyed with many Palestinians still missing and trapped under the rubble, according to local civil defence teams who were still working to pull people out.

Displaced Palestinians were sheltering in the schools, which were reportedly targeted without any prior warning.

Earlier on Thursday, Israeli forces stepped up airstrikes across the Gaza Strip, killing at least five Palestinians in a house in the heart of Gaza City.

Another airstrike in the southern city of Khan Younis killed one person and wounded others, according to medics.

NOTE: Every single day, Gaza’s population endures many airstrikes, tank shells, and snipers’ bullets – too many to report on here. And every day, more Palestinians are lost under the rubble of bombed-out buildings. We acknowledge that these are important stories, even if we are unable to cover them all.

A view of the destruction after an Israeli attack on Deir el-Balah, central Gaza, on Tuesday [Ashraf Amra/Anadolu]
A view of the destruction after an Israeli attack on Deir el-Balah, central Gaza, on Tuesday [Ashraf Amra/Anadolu] (photo)
World Food Program forced to reduce rations in Gaza

Al Jazeera reports: The deputy spokesperson for the UN secretary-general, Farhan Haq, explained that the World Food Program has been forced to reduce rations for Palestinians in Gaza because of the continuing war on the enclave.

“WFP urgently needs fuel deliveries, increased flow of blood supplies and greater capacity to deliver hot meals, particularly in Gaza City and north Gaza,” Haq said.

“WFP warns that it will be unable to bring in the quantity of food required this month unless more border crossing points into Gaza open and aid workers are able to bring in half the quantity of food needed in July and in the West Bank.”


Without ceasefire for vaccines, polio could spread throughout region: WHO specialist

Al Jazeera reports: The UN’s World Health Organization (WHO) has called for a ceasefire in Gaza to administer a mass polio vaccination campaign, including to 600,000 children under the age of eight, after samples of the disease were detected in the enclave’s wastewater.

Hamid Jafari, a polio specialist with the WHO, says that if such a ceasefire is not implemented and if healthcare workers are not granted enough freedom of movement to distribute all the vaccines, the risk of a polio outbreak both within Gaza and regionally is “very high”.

“This can spread very fast internationally and most importantly, it is a direct threat to the children of Gaza,” Jafari told Al Jazeera. “This can start paralysing children very very rapidly.”

He added: “If it [polio] spreads into Israel or the West Bank, it becomes a public health emergency there. Lebanon is at risk. Egypt is at risk. Jordan is at risk. And other countries of the region are at risk.

After Israel destroyed Gaza's water and sewage systems, filthy water runs or stands stagnant all over the enclave, carrying polio and other diseases.
After Israel destroyed Gaza’s water and sewage systems, filthy water runs or stands stagnant all over the enclave, carrying polio and other diseases. (collage)
Friendly Fire: Israeli Man Dies After Being Wounded by Malfunctioning Iron Dome Interceptor

Ha’aretz reports: The Israeli military said a preliminary investigation showed Samara was mistakenly struck by a malfunctioning interceptor rocket that was launched at a drone launched from Lebanon. The investigation showed that the rocket had fallen after failing to explode in the air as designed, it added.

Two others were wounded besides Samara: a woman who was hit by shrapnel from the explosion and a cyclist who was hit by a car during the alarm.

The hospital in the area said 19 people were admitted for treatment, including six soldiers – most of them requesting help for headaches, ringing in the ears and anxiety.

Israel bans imam Ekrima Sabri from Al-Aqsa Mosque for 6 more months

Al Jazeera reports: Israel has extended its ban on Al-Aqsa Mosque’s speaker Ekrima Sabri, restricting his access to the mosque and its courtyards for six more months, his lawyer tells Al Jazeera.

Sabri was detained on August 2 on suspicion of inciting “terrorism” after he mourned assassinated Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh at the mosque.

Sabri, 85, the former grand mufti of Jerusalem and current head of its Supreme Islamic Council, called Haniyeh a “martyr” at the mosque in Israeli-occupied East Jerusalem, his lawyer Hamzeh Qutteineh said at the time.

At the time, he was also banned from entering the mosque until August 8.

Sheikh Ekrima Sa’id Sabri, the former grand mufti of Jerusalem and the Palestinian territories walks outside an Israeli police station after being summoned for interrogation, in Jerusalem on January 2, 2023. [Saeed Qaq/NurPhoto via Getty Images]
Sheikh Ekrima Sa’id Sabri, the former grand mufti of Jerusalem and the Palestinian territories walks outside an Israeli police station after being summoned for interrogation, in Jerusalem on January 2, 2023. [Saeed Qaq/NurPhoto via Getty Images] (photo)
Smotrich demands punishment for person who filmed Sde Teiman rape video

Middle East Eye reports: Israel’s Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has called for an investigation to find out who took the video that shows Israeli soldiers raping a Palestinian in the Sde Teiman detention centre.

In a post on X, he demanded “an immediate criminal investigation to locate the leakers of the trending video that was intended to harm the reservists and that caused tremendous damage to Israel in the world and to exhaust the full severity of the law against them”.

NOTE: On Monday, Smotrich said that letting two million people in Gaza die from hunger is “justified and moral”.

Israeli journalist urges rape to become state policy for Palestinian prisoners

Andalou Agency reports: An Israeli journalist advocated rape Thursday as an official policy by the state for Palestinian prisoners in the Israeli jails.

“The only thing that is a problem for me here is that it is not a regulated policy of the state to abuse the (Palestinian) detainees,” journalist Yehuda Schlesinger said on a television program on Channel 12 when asked if raping prisoners is acceptable.

He justified his comments by claiming, “Because first of all, they deserve it, and it is great revenge that we need to give them.”

“And secondly, maybe it will also serve us a little more as a deterrent,” he said. “It is just a shame that we don’t do it in an institutionalized way as a part of regulations for torture of prisoners.”

The comments follow reports by media outlets that showed a video of Israeli soldier raping a Palestinian detainee at the Sde Teiman Prison in the Negev desert in southern Israel.

A leaked video showing Israeli soldiers sexually assaulting a Palestinian detainee from Gaza has emerged. (Photo: video grab)
A leaked video showing Israeli soldiers sexually assaulting a Palestinian detainee from Gaza has emerged. (Photo: video grab) (photo)
Israeli lawmaker says ‘Nablus should look like Rafah’

Middle East Eye reports: Israeli member of parliament Zvi Sukkot, a member of the far-right Religious Zionist Party, said Israel should act in the occupied West Bank the same way it is acting in the Gaza Strip.

“We still see processions of armed men,” he said. “Maybe we are waiting for them to try to shoot someone? This is a disturbing event, an unacceptable reality. Nablus should look like Rafah as long as it exports terror, Tulkarm like Khan Younis, Jenin like Jabalia.”

Israeli forces have killed at least 620 Palestinians in the West Bank since the start of the war on Gaza, according to the Palestinian health ministry.




Israeli lawmakers, settler leaders unite to legalize Gaza settlements: Report

The Cradle reports: Israel’s Channel 12 reported on 8 August that lawmakers from the Likud and Religious Zionism parties have formed a “civilian parliamentary working group” alongside settler leaders that seeks to legitimize the resettlement of Gaza by repealing the 2005 disengagement law.

The working group reportedly expects to present the draft bill at the opening of the next Knesset session.

Approved in 2005, the Gaza Disengagement Law led to the dismantling of the Gush Katif settlement bloc in the strip and four Jewish settlement outposts in the occupied West Bank. For several years preceding the current war, religious Zionist settlers in Israel called for a war to conquer Gaza, reverse the disengagement, and rebuild Gush Katif.


Israeli army responds to announcement of World Central Kitchen of Israel’s killing of staff

The US-based World Central Kitchen aid group had announced the killing of a Palestinian staff member, Nadi Sallout, near Gaza’s Deir el-Balah.

The Times of Israel newspaper reports that the Israeli military said it conducted a preliminary examination and held a conversation with the WCK about the reported killing.

It claimed that “there is no known incident of harm to an employee of the organization while working in the last few days,” adding, “The [army] examines each unusual incident individually.”

In early April, Israel killed seven people working with the United States-based NGO in an attack on the Gaza Strip.

NOTE: Israel’s self-investigations consistently whitewash its crimes and fail to appropriately punish the perpetrators. Israeli sources, including the government itself, have a long track record of lying (for example, this and this and this.)


US To Let Israel Restart Military Operations in Gaza After First Phase of Ceasefire Deal

As Ha’aretz reports ceasefire negotiations are nearly completed, AntiWar reports: The US is ready to guarantee that it would allow Israel to restart the genocidal war in Gaza after the first phase of any hostage and ceasefire deal that might be reached with Hamas, according to Israeli media reports.

The Israeli condition could make Hamas less likely to agree to a deal since one of its main demands has been a permanent ceasefire and Israeli withdrawal from Gaza.

According to The Times of Israel, a proposal that’s been discussed would involve three phases where Israel would halt its military operations and Hamas would release hostages. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants a guarantee that he’ll be able to restart military operations after the first phase, which is when negotiations will be held on implementing the next two phases.

The US has not yet provided a written agreement that it would allow Israel to restart operations but has expressed its approval of the idea. Yedioth Ahronoth reported that the US wouldn’t give the guarantee in writing until an agreement is reached with Hamas.


Israel ‘working to block’ sanctions on violent settlers: Netanyahu

Israeli government press release: The Israeli prime minister held a meeting Thursday in Tel Aviv with council heads from illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank to discuss their concerns about the effects of the Western sanctions imposed on a limited number of violent settlers and organizations.

Regarding the sanctions against the settlers and the organizations, Prime Minister Netanyahu noted that he views this with utmost gravity and said: “We are working to block this. It is an issue for the entire State of Israel, not just Judea and Samaria.”

RECOMMENDED READING: Israel revokes diplomatic status of Norwegian envoys

Netanyahu: Israel should have waged war against Hamas sooner

In an exclusive interview given to the US’s Time Magazine, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he made a mistake not launching a full-scale war against the Palestinian group in the years leading up to its October 7 attacks on Israel.

He blamed the Israeli security establishment for its hesitation, and himself for acceding to their reluctance.

“October 7 showed that those who said that Hamas was deterred were wrong,” he said to Time during his interview. “If anything, I didn’t challenge enough the assumption that was common to all the security agencies.”

[In reality, Israel had frequently waged war on Gaza.]




White House denounces Cori Bush’s ‘inflammatory’ words to AIPAC after primary loss

The Hill reports: Asked for President Biden’s thoughts on Bush’s vow to challenge AIPAC, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said the president condemns that kind of “divisive” and “inflammatory” rhetoric.

Earlier this week, Cori Bush told supporters, “They’re about to see this other Cori, this other side…All they did was radicalize me, so now they need to be afraid,” and, “AIPAC, I’m coming to tear your kingdom down.”

The White House press secretary said of this comment, “Look, the president has always been very clear — and very recently, after the assassination attempt of the last president — about lowering rhetoric, right? Lowering political rhetoric and the importance of doing that,” Jean-Pierre said Wednesday at the daily press briefing.

“It is important — important that we be very mindful of what we say. This kind of rhetoric is inflammatory and divisive and incredibly unhelpful.”

“We’re going to continue to condemn any type of political rhetoric in that way, in that vein,” she continued. “And so, it is important to be mindful in what we say and how we say it. But we cannot have this type of inflammatory, divisive language in our political discourse.”

NOTE: In what some analysts have called an attack on the democratic process, AIPAC spent over $17 million to topple Rep. Jamaal Bowman, D-N.Y., in June, and around $26 million to defeat Cori Bush. The administration’s position toward Bush’s comment indicates it is more worried about challenges to Israel’s primacy in US politics than the fact that Congressional seats are for sale.



Kamala’s husband, the US Second Gentleman, claims ‘We’re witnessing the worst wave of Jew-hatred since World War II’

Ha’aretz reports: Talking to the media while visiting Paris, U.S. Second Gentleman Douglas Emhoff said that “There is a ferocious surge of antisemitism occurring around the world, including here in France. It is a crisis.”

We are witnessing the worst wave of Jew-hatred the globe has experienced since World War II,” he added.

According to the second gentleman, “When Jews are targeted because of their beliefs or identity, and when Israel is singled out because of anti-Jewish hatred, that is antisemitism.”

NOTE: A large portion of alleged antisemitism is opposition to Zionism, a racist ideology under which Israel dispossessed 750,000 Palestinian people and exiled them to Gaza and other locations. The so-called “demonization” of Israel is in most cases a legitimate criticism of Israel’s policies of occupation, apartheid, and genocide, and other illegal practices.

Activists in Minnesota: ‘Governor Walz has refused to meet Palestinian families’

Middle East Eye reports: It’s been 10 months since Israel’s war on Gaza began, and Governor Tim Walz, the newly appointed vice-presidential nominee on Kamala Harris’ ticket, has yet to meet with Palestinian families from his home state of Minnesota, anti-war activists have told Middle East Eye.

The accusations are in stark contrast to the public image being conjured up by the Democratic Party establishment to present Walz, along with presidential hopeful Kamala Harris, as more sympathetic and empathetic towards the carnage suffered by Palestinians over the past 10 months.

But according to several activists in Minnesota, not only has the governor refused to meet with Palestinian families who have lost relatives in Israel’s war on Gaza, he has barely acknowledged their concerns and and demands.

Sana Wazwaz, spokesperson for the group, said the Palestinian community had been trying for months to arrange a meeting with the governor to talk about the devastating losses in Gaza and their demands for an arms embargo on Israel.

When they did manage to arrange a meeting with the governor for early July, it was abruptly cancelled when they explained to the governor’s staff that they had come to discuss “material solutions” with the governor and not merely to narrate “sob stories” about the loss of their loved ones.

When asked why the meeting had been cancelled, they were told that the governor “was prepared to listen to you tell your stories, but we weren’t prepared to talk about divestment”.

“Walz wanted us for the PR stunt and not for actual, genuine conversation about political change. He just wanted to check it off the list that he met with another marginalized group that he’s been ignoring for months upon months,” Wazwaz explained.

“We have been trying for months to arrange a meeting. Phone calls have been made, but Governor Walz has refused to show up for any of the Palestinian families; has refused to sit down and meet with them, has refused to, you know, visit a single mosque or a single Palestinian institution to check in on our families,” Wazwaz said.

Activists also point out that Walz’s nomination has also garnered praise from liberal pro-Israel lobbying groups in the US. J Street described the Harris-Walz team as “pro-Israel”; Mark Mellman, chair of Democratic Majority for Israel described Walz as a “proud pro-Israel Democrat with a strong record of supporting the US-Israel relationship”.

COUNTERPUNCH ADDS: Harris has offered sympathetic words on Gaza: “The images of dead children and desperate, hungry people fleeing for safety – sometimes displaced for a second, third, or fourth time – we cannot look away in the face of these tragedies. We cannot allow ourselves to become numb to the suffering, and I will not be silent.”

Eman Abdelhadi of the University of Chicago finds such sentiments from Harris parch dry, arguing that a lack of “an actual commitment to stop killing the children of Gaza” invalidates any claims to empathy. “To be empathetic to someone that you’re shooting in the head is not exactly laudable. We don’t need empathy from these people. We need to stop providing the weapons and the money that is actively killing the people that they’re supposedly empathising with.”

[Also see Glenn Greenwald’s commentary.]


MORE NEWS:

IMEMC Daily Reports.

The Intercept: The Outrageous Case of an NY Journalist Charged With a Hate Crime for Recording a Gaza Protest Action

Caitlin Johnson: US Policy: Let Israel Escalate Against Iran, Then Tell Iran Not To Escalate Back

Middle East Monitor: In Gaza, keeping the internet on can cost lives but also save them


STATISTICS OCTOBER 7 – AUGUST 8:

Palestinian death toll from October 7 – August 8: at least 40,315* (39,699 in Gaza* – 11,445 women (30%), 16,251 children as of July 22. [The Ministry’s figures have been contested by the Israeli authorities, although they have been accepted as accurate by Israeli intelligence services, the UN, and WHO. These data are supported by independent analyses, comparing changes in the number of deaths of UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) staff with those reported by the Ministry, which found claims of data fabrication implausible.]

This is expected to be a significant undercount since thousands of those killed have yet to be identified – and at least 616 in the West Bank (~140 children). This does not include an estimated 10,000 more still buried under rubble (4,900 women and children). Euro-Med Monitor reports 46,848 Palestinian deaths.

Lancet: “Applying a conservative estimate of four indirect deaths per one direct death9 to the 37,396 deaths reported, it is not implausible to estimate that up to 186 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza.

Ralph Nader earlier estimated 200,000 Palestinians may have been killed in Gaza.

At least 45 Palestinians have died in Israeli prisons (27 from Gaza, 18 from West Bank).
At least 41 Palestinians have died due to malnutrition**.
About 1.7 million, or 75% of Gaza’s population are currently displaced.
2.15 million (out of total population of 2.3 million) are projected to face Crisis or worse levels of food insecurity.
Palestinian injuries from October 7 – August 8: at least 97,142 (including at least 91,722 in Gaza and 5,420 in the West Bank, including 830 children). [It remains unknown how man Americans are among the casualties in Gaza.]

Reported Israeli death toll from October 7 – August 8: ~1,486 (~1,139 on October 7, 2023, of which ~32 were Americans, and ~36 were children); 331 military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza; 16 in the West Bank) and~8,730 injured.

Times of Israel reports: The IDF listed 41 soldiers killed due to friendly fire in Gaza and other military-related accidents – nearly 16%.

NOTE: It is unknown at this time how many of the deaths and injuries in Israel on October 7 were caused by Israeli soldiers.

*Previously, IAK did not include 471 Gazans killed in the Al Ahli hospital blast since the source of the projectile was being disputed. However, given that much evidence points to Israel as the culprit, Israel had previously bombed the hospital and has attacked many others, Israel is prohibiting outside experts from investigating the scene, and since the UN and other agencies are including the deaths from the attack in their cumulative totals, if Americans knew is now also doing so.**

Euro-Med Monitor reports that Gaza’s elderly are dying at an alarmingly high rate. The majority die at home and are buried either close to their residences or in makeshift graves dispersed across the Strip. There are currently more than 140 such cemeteries. Additionally, according to Euromed, thousands have died from starvation, malnourishment, and inadequate medical care; these are considered indirect victims as they were not registered in hospitals.

† For most of the conflict, women and children accounted for about 70% of deaths in Gaza, with children making up a little over 40% of those killed, according to official statistics.

Find previous daily casualty figures and daily news updates here.

Hover over each bar for exact numbers.
Source: IsraelPalestineTimeline.org

Human rights reports on Israel-Palestine (regularly updated)
Western media continue to withhold the truth about Israel and Gaza – 4 stories
“Well What SHOULD Israel Have Done After October 7?”
Welcome to Hell
More dead children. More BBC ‘news’ channelling Israeli propaganda as its own
U.S. media downplays and ignores ICJ ruling declaring Israeli occupation illegal
Israeli soldiers tell story of savage cruelty in Gaza – one given blessing by the West
Searching for Gaza’s missing children
What Would You Do With An Extra $320 Million?
Assassination of Haniyeh an intentional, dangerous escalation – Parsi, Macgregor
When Israel Burned Refugees Alive, Establishment Media Called It a ‘Tragic Accident’
Israel has turbocharged West Bank housing demolitions under the cover of war
Western media ignores Israeli confirmation of Hannibal Directive on 7 Oct
US Should Arrest Benjamin Netanyahu When He’s in Washington
Airwars investigation: Israeli airstrikes uniquely lethal (video)
Hesen Jabr paid the price of conscience
Gaza genocide denial
Why the news media’s job is to groom us
‘Disappeared, buried, detained’: The horrors of Gaza’s missing children
Hundreds of social media influencers attend Israel strategy summit in NYC
Supporting Israel Is Big Business in the U.S. for Israel partisans
Toys, spices, sewing machines: the items Israel banned from entering Gaza
Synopsis of ICJ’s decision on Israeli occupation, reactions, and take-aways
Russia attacks hospitals in Ukraine; Israel does the same in Gaza. The US response couldn’t be more different.
‘I have the prison inside me’: The emaciated Palestinian bodybuilder broken by Israel
Israel has manufactured an industrial-scale version of Jim Crow rape hoaxes
If Americans Knew Mobile Billboard Truck at Republican Convention
Col. Douglas MacGregor: US is under the control of Israel, likens Gaza to Warsaw Ghetto


https://israelpalestinenews.org/gazans-starve-israeli-rhetoric-more-radically-anti-palestinian-day-306/

As Israel continues killing in Gaza, more torture and rape allegations surface – Day 304
[email protected] August 7, 2024 anti-masking law, ceasefire, evacuation, gaza death toll, Israeli prisons, malnutrition gaza, palestinian journalist killed, rape, tim walz, torture, turkey joins icj, turkiye, us troops to israel, west bank deaths
Israeli air strikes have targeted parts of central Gaza where tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians have sought shelter. Pictured: the aftermath of a bombing in Deir el Balah (screengrab)
166th Palestinian journalist killed; child malnutrition in Gaza; another evacuation order; Gaza’s official death toll is way too low; news of Israeli torture and rape of Palestinian prisoners keeps coming, keeps getting worse; Israel killed 12 West Bank Palestinians in 24 hours; majority of Americans don’t support sending troops to assist Israel; NY anti-masking law targets pro-Palestine protesters; VP candidate Tim Walz on Palestine; ceasefire agreement allegedly getting close; Turkey joins ICJ case against Israel; more.

By IAK staff, from reports.

Another Palestinian journalist killed in Israeli attack on Gaza

Al Jazeera reports: Gaza’s Government Media Office says the number of journalists killed in Israeli attacks has risen to 166 since the start of Israel’s war.

It said in a statement that Mohammed Issa Abu Saada, a correspondent and field photojournalist for several media outlets, is the latest to be killed.

Child malnutrition surges in Gaza: UN

OCHA reports: In the five-day period up to Monday, 143 Palestinians were reported killed and 341 injured by Israeli attacks on Gaza from air, land and sea forces, according to the UN’s latest situation report.

Detected cases of child malnutrition in Gaza have jumped almost 50 percent in July compared with June, with more than 650 Palestinian children now suffering from “acute malnutrition” in the enclave, which is a three-fold increase in cases since May.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) also reports that an estimated 10,000 people remain missing or under the rubble of destroyed buildings in Gaza.

Save the Children, in a new statement, said 21,000 children are missing, some separated from their families, some buried under the rubble, their fate unknown. The advocacy group calls for a ceasefire to look for the missing children. Israel's abuses saw it added to the UN's global blacklist of countries that harm children.
Save the Children, in a new statement, said 21,000 children are missing, some separated from their families, some buried under the rubble, their fate unknown. The advocacy group calls for a ceasefire to look for the missing children. Israel’s abuses saw it added to the UN’s global blacklist of countries that harm children. (screenshot)
Israeli Military Orders Another Mass Evacuation in Northern Gaza – ‘To the Known Shelters’

Palestine Chronicle reports: The Israeli military threatened a new military operation in the northern Gaza Strip under the pretext of the firing of rockets from the area.

In a tweet published early Wednesday on the X platform, Israeli army spokesman Avichai Adraee said that all those in the Beit Hanoun area, the Manshiya and Sheikh Zayed neighborhoods should evacuate their areas immediately to “known shelters” in the center of Gaza City.

He added that Hamas and other factions were firing rockets from those areas and that the Israeli army would act “immediately and forcefully against them.”

Throughout the war, Israel has repeatedly targeted refugee encampments of displaced Gazans, resulting in the killing and wounding of thousands.

Israel’s Channel 12 said the army was preparing for what it described as large-scale ground activity in Beit Hanoun.

Meanwhile, there are reports of shelling all over Gaza.

RECOMMENDED READING: ‘The martyrs were cut up and burned’: Survivors of the latest tent massacre in Gaza recount the horror

A scene from the massive fire ignited when Israel struck Rafah
A scene from the massive fire ignited when Israel struck Rafah on May 26 (screenshot)
Gaza’s official death toll is a lie

Jonathan Cook writes: The reported death toll in Gaza is way too low by every imaginable metric. We need to be stressing this — all the more so when Israel’s apologists are vigorously engaged in a disinformation campaign to suggest that the figures are inflated.

On May 6, seven months into Israel’s slaughter, there were reported to be 34,735 dead. That was an average of 4,960 Palestinians killed each month.

Today, nearly three months on, the reported death toll stands at 39,400 — or an increase of 4,665.

It should not need a statistician to point out that, were the rise linear, the expected number of deaths would stand by this point at around 49,600.

So, even by the simplest calculation, there is a large shortfall in deaths — a shortfall that needs explaining.

Such an explanation is easy to provide: Israel destroyed Gaza’s institutions and its medical infrastructure, including its hospitals, many months ago, making it impossible for officials there to keep track of how many Palestinians are being killed by Israel.

The death toll figures started to stall in the spring, around the time Israel completed its destruction of Gaza’s hospitals and kidnapped much of the enclave’s medical personnel.

More than a month ago, Save the Children pointed out that some 21,000 children in Gaza were missing, in addition to the 16,000 known to have been killed by Israel. Many are likely to have suffered lonely, terrifying deaths under rubble — gradually suffocated to death, or dying slowly from dehydration.

But again, even those shocking figures are likely to be a severe undercount.

(Read the full article here.)




Reports of torture in Israel’s Sde Teiman ‘only represent the tip of iceberg’

UN Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights: Reports of alleged torture and sexual violence in Israel’s Sde Teiman prison are grossly illegal and revolting, but they only represent the tip of the iceberg, independent human rights experts* warned today.

“Israel’s widespread and systemic abuse of Palestinians in detention and arbitrary arrest practices over decades, coupled with the absence of any restraints by the Israeli State since 7 October 2023, paint a shocking picture enabled by absolute impunity,” the experts said.

Around 9,500 Palestinians, including hundreds of children and women, are currently imprisoned—around one-third without charge or trial. Another unknown number are arbitrarily being held in detention facilities and ad hoc camps following a wave of arrest and abduction campaigns across Palestinian territory that targeted men, women and children particularly following 7 October.

The experts received substantiated reports of widespread abuse, torture, sexual assault and rape, amid atrocious inhumane conditions, with at least 53 Palestinians apparently dying as a result in 10 months.

Countless testimonies by men and women speak of detainees in cage-like enclosures, tied to beds blindfolded and in diapers, stripped naked, deprived of adequate healthcare, food, water and sleep, electrocutions including on their genitals, blackmail and cigarette burns. In addition, victims spoke of loud music played until their ears bled, attacks by dogs, waterboarding, suspension from ceilings and severe sexual and gender-based violence.

“Allegations of gang-rape of a Palestinian detainee, now shockingly supported by voices in the Israeli political establishment and society, provide irrefutable evidence that the moral compass is lost,” the experts said. In February 2024, a number of experts also expressed grave concern regarding the reports of sexual and other forms of gender-based violence committed against Palestinian women and girls in Israeli detention.

(Read the full statement here.)

NOTE: The Cradle reported yesterday that US President Joe Biden has apparently agreed to guarantee that Israel will be able to resume the war against the Palestinian resistance in Gaza after the first phase of an exchange deal, according to Hebrew media. This is the “absolute impunity” to which this report referred.

A leaked photograph of the detention facility shows a blindfolded man with his arms above his head. Obtained by CNN
A leaked photograph of the detention facility shows a blindfolded man with his arms above his head. Obtained by CNN (photo)
Key takeaways from B’Tselem’s report on Israel’s ‘torture camps’

The Israeli human rights group B’Tselem collected testimonies from 55 Palestinians, including 21 from the Gaza Strip, who had been held in Israeli prisons since October 7.

The detainees spoke to B’Tselem following their release – here are some details:

The B’Tselem report reveals that more than a dozen Israeli prison facilities were converted into a network of camps “dedicated to the abuse of inmates” following October 7.
“Such spaces, in which every inmate is intentionally condemned to severe, relentless pain and suffering, operate in fact as torture camps,” it said.
The violations include “frequent acts of severe, arbitrary violence; sexual assault; humiliation and degradation; deliberate starvation; forced unhygienic conditions; sleep deprivation; prohibition on, and punitive measures for, religious worship; confiscation of all communal and personal belongings; and denial of adequate medical treatment”.
B’Tselem said at least 60 Palestinians have died in Israeli custody since October 7. Some 48 of them were from Gaza.
The report said that detainee testimonies demonstrate “a systemic, institutional policy focused on the continual abuse and torture of all Palestinian prisoners”. This policy, it said, is implemented under the direction of Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir, with the full support of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
B’Tselem also noted that the number of Palestinians held in Israeli jails has doubled to 9,623 since the war on Gaza began.
Executive summary of the B’Tselem report can be found here; full report here.

Israeli soldiers stand by a truck packed with stripped, bound, and blindfolded Palestinian prisoners, Friday December 8, 2023
Israeli soldiers stand by a truck packed with stripped, bound, and blindfolded Palestinian prisoners, Friday December 8, 2023 (photo)
UN probe into UNRWA not given full access to Israeli evidence

UNRWA reported earlier this week that an internal UN investigation concluded that nine UNRWA staff members “may have been involved” in the 7 October attacks.

The UN has now revealed that it does not have 100% conclusive evidence, and that the UN’s Office of Internal Oversight Services was never given full access to Israel’s evidence that it claims it has against the UN personnel.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres ordered this internal review shortly after Israel leveled its claims against UNRWA personnel in late January. Now, because of legal and confidentiality reasons, this OIOS report will not be made public.

Meanwhile, since October 7, more than 200 UNRWA personnel have been killed due to Israel’s continued bombardment of the Gaza Strip.

In Less Than A Day, Israel Killed Twelve Palestinians In West Bank

IMEMC reports: The Israeli occupation army has killed, overnight and earlier Tuesday, twelve Palestinians in Jenin, Tubas, and Bethlehem, in the occupied West Bank.

In Jenin, the army fired a missile at the eastern neighborhood of the city, killing five Palestinians whose bodies have been severely mutilated.

Wisam Bakr, the director of the Jenin Governmental Hospital, said the severely mutilated corpses of five Palestinians were transferred to the medical facility after the army fired a missile at them in the Eastern Neighborhood, and prevented Palestinian medics from entering the area for several hours.

Details on the deaths are here.

RECOMMENDED READING: Far right pulling masks off Israeli legal charade



Israelis continue to protest detention of soldiers accused of raping Palestinian prisoner

Al Jazeera reports: Israelis are demonstrating in front of the military court at the Beit Lid base in the center of the country, to protest the continued detention of five reserve soldiers accused of sexually assaulting a Palestinian prisoner in Sde Teiman prison in the Negev desert.

Last week, dozens of Israeli protesters, including far-right members of the Knesset, clashed with military police after at least nine soldiers suspected of abusing a Palestinian prisoner were detained for questioning.

Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth said the demonstration comes ahead of the start of a court hearing on the third extension of the detention of the five soldiers.

Demonstrators chanted slogans such as “This is the state of the Jews and it precedes democracy” and called for the release of the accused soldiers.

Israeli reservists fail polygraph probing sexual abuse allegations: Report

Al Jazeera reports: Two Israeli reservists suspected of sexually abusing a Palestinian prisoner have failed a polygraph test about the allegations, reports Israel’s Channel 12.

The soldiers, among five still detained over sexual abuse allegations at Israel’s Sde Teiman facility, denied committing or covering up an act of sexual assault during the polygraph examination, but the examiner deemed their responses deceptive, said the report.

The allegations against the reservists have divided Israeli society, with a group of far-right activists storming the facility they were held at last week demanding their release.

Israeli forces blindfold and strip Palestinian prisoners who are arbitrarily detained
Israeli forces blindfold and strip Palestinian prisoners who are arbitrarily detained (photo)
Poll: Most Americans don’t want to send troops to defend Israel

Responsible Statecraft reports: According to a survey by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, only 41% of Americans support the idea of U.S. troops defending Israel, even if its neighbors attacked it. This is a decrease from 53% in 2021 and represents the lowest level of support since the the council started tracking the question in 2010.

According to the survey, 55% of Americans overall are against the idea of sending troops to defend Israel. These numbers show a decrease in support from Republicans, typically Israel’s biggest supporters, from 72% in 2021 to 55% today. Democrats went from 42% in favor of defending Israel with U.S. troops in 2021 to 35% today.

The poll was conducted online from June 21 through July 1.

Americans still believe in a peacekeeping mission, however, with 54 percent of Americans supporting sending peacekeeping troops if a deal between Israel and the Palestinians is arranged and kept, according to the survey.

One Year in Prison and a Fine: NY Mask Ban Targets Palestine Protesters

Palestine Chronicle reports: New York’s suburban Nassau County has passed a bill to ban the wearing of masks intended to hide the identity of pro-Palestinian protesters against US support for Israel’s war in Gaza, Reuters has reported.

The mask ban will cover any sort of public protest, but lawmakers in the Republican-controlled county say that the bill aims to prevent protesters who engage in alleged violence and anti-Semitism from hiding their identity and avoiding accountability.

Civil rights advocates view the step as an infringement on free speech rights.

The bill was approved late on Monday, with all 12 Republicans in the county legislature voting in favor. The seven Democrats abstained.

Veterans for Peace call for immediate ceasefire in Gaza
Veterans for Peace call for immediate ceasefire in Gaza (screenshot)
Tim Walz called Gaza situation “Intolerable,” sought ceasefire, praised Uncommitted; Shapiro did not

Informed Comment reports: Presumptive Democratic Party standard-bearer Kamala Harris’ pick of Minnesota governor Tim Walz as her running mate has widely been implied to have something to do with his stance on the Gaza genocide.

On March 5, Super Tuesday, Abby Phillip at CNN asked Walz about the Gaza protest vote: “We’re seeing a fairly sizable, about 40,000 votes right now, 20 percent of the vote going to uncommitted. And we’ve seen that already in this primary in Michigan. What message are voters in your state trying to send to President Biden? And what do you want to see President Biden do in response?”

Walz replied, “Yeah, look, they’re engaged. We’re really proud of Minnesota civic responsibility. We have some of the highest voter turnouts. These are voters that are deeply concerned as we all are. The situation in Gaza is intolerable. And I think trying to find a solution, a lasting two-state solution, certainly the President’s move towards humanitarian aid and asking us to get to a ceasefire, that’s what they’re asking to be heard. And that’s what they should be doing. We’ve gone through this before. And we know that now we make sure we’ve got eight months. We start bringing these folks back in. We listen to what they’re saying.”

The important thing here is that Walz did not simply dismiss the Uncommitted movement or condemn it. He heard their concern and said it mirrored his own. “The situation in Gaza is intolerable.” He approved of getting “to a ceasefire” and humanitarian aid.

The Intercept reports: “Harris’s selection of Walz could also signal a shift from President Joe Biden’s stance on Israel’s war in Gaza.”

“Zogby, founder and president of the Arab American Institute, contrasted Walz with Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, who was widely reported to be the other frontrunner for Harris’s running mate, and believes that rejecting Shapiro in favor of Walz bodes well for Harris’s approach to the world.”

“It’s impossible to know exactly what calculations were made and what issues mattered the most,” Duss said, referring to the Walz selection. “But I think it’s clear that there is a growing constituency in the Democratic Party that takes the issue of Palestinian rights much more seriously than in previous years, and it has to be engaged with and its views have to be taken into account.”

“By deciding against Shapiro, Duss said, Harris is showing that she is to some degree listening to this movement within the party…”

“Some observers also noted Walz’s antiwar record while a member of Congress, pointing to his opposition to a war in Syria in 2013 and his support of repealing the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force, which has given the White House broad powers to bypass Congress to conduct attacks and military operations in other countries.”

The NY times reports: “Selecting Gov. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania could mollify many Jewish voters and other centrists over a subject that has bedeviled the Biden-Harris administration for nearly a year, Israel’s war in Gaza. It could also inflame the left, which has been protesting the administration for months.

“Ms. Harris’s selection of Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota likely avoided fueling the Gaza demonstrations.”

[Tim Walz [File: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images via AFP]
[Tim Walz [File: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images via AFP] (photo)
Blinken says ceasefire negotiations have reached ‘final stage’

Al Jazeera reports: US Secretary of State Blinken has pressed for a ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza and warned against the possibility of worsening regional escalation.

Here are a few of Blinken’s key remarks:

An agreement between Israel and Hamas is in the “final stage” and called on all parties to finalise it “as soon as possible”.
Further attacks “only perpetuate” conflict, instability and insecurity.
The US has told Iran and Israel “directly” that regional fighting must not escalate further.
The Cradle reported yesterday that the US has agreed to guarantee that Israel will be able to resume the war against the Palestinian resistance in Gaza after the first phase of an exchange deal, according to Hebrew media.

If the ceasefire agreement says that Israel can resume the war, it is unlikely that Hamas will agree.

Turkey submits bid to join ICJ case against Israel

Middle East Eye reports: Turkey has reportedly submitted its formal bid to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to join South Africa’s genocide case against Israel.

According to the report, Turkey’s ambassador to the Netherlands, Selcuk Unal, presented a “comprehensive and detailed” application to the UN court in The Hague on Wednesday.

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, who announced the move on Monday, said that Ankara has prepared a dossier that will likely significantly impact the trial.

Turkey’s intervention is expected to be the most impactful in the case, and likely to encourage other countries to join.

International Court of Justice, The Hague, Netherlands
International Court of Justice, The Hague, Netherlands (photo)
US and UK to boycott Nagasaki bombing memorial after Israel disinvited

Middle East Eye reports: The American and British ambassadors to Japan have announced they will skip an upcoming ceremony commemorating the victims of the US’s 1945 atomic bombing because the city’s mayor did not invite the Israeli ambassador.

The Russian and Belarusian ambassadors have also been excluded from the event this Friday by Japanese authorities.

The Nagasaki Peace Memorial Ceremony is intended to mark the 79th anniversary of the US atomic bomb attacks on Nagasaki and Hiroshima that killed tens of thousands of Japanese civilians, with many more later dying from radiation poisoning.

Pentagon confirms US troops injured in attack on Iraqi air base

The Cradle reports: At least five US soldiers and contractors were injured during a rocket attack that hit Iraq’s Ain al-Asad air base late on 5 August, Pentagon officials have confirmed.

US defense officials revealed to Reuters that at least one person was “seriously injured.” “Base personnel are conducting a post-attack damage assessment,” the unnamed officials added.

The US military took control of Ain al-Assad in 2003 following the White House’s illegal invasion and occupation of the country but withdrew its forces in 2011 when Barack Obama failed to secure a new Status of Forces (SOFA) agreement with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

However, US forces returned to the base under the pretext of training Iraqis to fight ISIS six months after the extremist group invaded and occupied Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest city, in June 2014. They have remained there since.

Ain al-Assad air base had been targeted at least twice over the past three weeks as local resistance groups working under the Islamic Resistance in Iraq (IRI) umbrella have steadily resumed pro-Palestine operations that were halted earlier this year.

Wednesday’s attack comes just a few days after a US airstrike killed four members of the anti-terror Popular Mobilization Units (PMU) north of Babil.

[Note: Israel partisans were largely responsible for the disastrous US decision to invade Iraq.]

RECOMMENDED READING: The U.S. has dozens of secret bases across the Middle East. They keep getting attacked.

MORE NEWS:

IMEMC Daily Reports.

Drop Site News: Microsoft Encourages Employee Donations to Illegal West Bank Settlements, While Barring UNRWA

STATISTICS OCTOBER 7 – AUGUST 6:

Palestinian death toll from October 7 – August 6: at least 40,292* (39,677 in Gaza* – 11,445 women (30%), 16,251 children as of July 22. [The Ministry’s figures have been contested by the Israeli authorities, although they have been accepted as accurate by Israeli intelligence services, the UN, and WHO. These data are supported by independent analyses, comparing changes in the number of deaths of UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) staff with those reported by the Ministry, which found claims of data fabrication implausible.]

This is expected to be a significant undercount since thousands of those killed have yet to be identified – and at least 615 in the West Bank (~140 children). This does not include an estimated 10,000 more still buried under rubble (4,900 women and children). Euro-Med Monitor reports 46,848 Palestinian deaths.

Lancet: “Applying a conservative estimate of four indirect deaths per one direct death9 to the 37,396 deaths reported, it is not implausible to estimate that up to 186 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza.

Ralph Nader earlier estimated 200,000 Palestinians may have been killed in Gaza.

At least 45 Palestinians have died in Israeli prisons (27 from Gaza, 18 from West Bank).
At least 41 Palestinians have died due to malnutrition**.
About 1.7 million, or 75% of Gaza’s population are currently displaced.
2.15 million (out of total population of 2.3 million) are projected to face Crisis or worse levels of food insecurity.
Palestinian injuries from October 7 – August 6: at least 97,065 (including at least 91,645 in Gaza and 5,420 in the West Bank, including 830 children). [It remains unknown how man Americans are among the casualties in Gaza.]

Reported Israeli death toll from October 7 – August 6: ~1,486 (~1,139 on October 7, 2023, of which ~32 were Americans, and ~36 were children); 331 military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza; 16 in the West Bank) and~8,730 injured.

Times of Israel reports: The IDF listed 41 soldiers killed due to friendly fire in Gaza and other military-related accidents – nearly 16%.

NOTE: It is unknown at this time how many of the deaths and injuries in Israel on October 7 were caused by Israeli soldiers.

*Previously, IAK did not include 471 Gazans killed in the Al Ahli hospital blast since the source of the projectile was being disputed. However, given that much evidence points to Israel as the culprit, Israel had previously bombed the hospital and has attacked many others, Israel is prohibiting outside experts from investigating the scene, and since the UN and other agencies are including the deaths from the attack in their cumulative totals, if Americans knew is now also doing so.**

Euro-Med Monitor reports that Gaza’s elderly are dying at an alarmingly high rate. The majority die at home and are buried either close to their residences or in makeshift graves dispersed across the Strip. There are currently more than 140 such cemeteries. Additionally, according to Euromed, thousands have died from starvation, malnourishment, and inadequate medical care; these are considered indirect victims as they were not registered in hospitals.

† For most of the conflict, women and children accounted for about 70% of deaths in Gaza, with children making up a little over 40% of those killed, according to official statistics.

Find previous daily casualty figures and daily news updates here.

Hover over each bar for exact numbers.
Source: IsraelPalestineTimeline.org

Human rights reports on Israel-Palestine (regularly updated)
“Well What SHOULD Israel Have Done After October 7?”
Welcome to Hell
More dead children. More BBC ‘news’ channelling Israeli propaganda as its own
U.S. media downplays and ignores ICJ ruling declaring Israeli occupation illegal
Israeli soldiers tell story of savage cruelty in Gaza – one given blessing by the West
Searching for Gaza’s missing children
What Would You Do With An Extra $320 Million?
Assassination of Haniyeh an intentional, dangerous escalation – Parsi, Macgregor
When Israel Burned Refugees Alive, Establishment Media Called It a ‘Tragic Accident’
Israel has turbocharged West Bank housing demolitions under the cover of war
Western media ignores Israeli confirmation of Hannibal Directive on 7 Oct
US Should Arrest Benjamin Netanyahu When He’s in Washington
Airwars investigation: Israeli airstrikes uniquely lethal (video)
Hesen Jabr paid the price of conscience
Gaza genocide denial
Why the news media’s job is to groom us
‘Disappeared, buried, detained’: The horrors of Gaza’s missing children
Hundreds of social media influencers attend Israel strategy summit in NYC
Supporting Israel Is Big Business in the U.S. for Israel partisans
Toys, spices, sewing machines: the items Israel banned from entering Gaza
Synopsis of ICJ’s decision on Israeli occupation, reactions, and take-aways
Russia attacks hospitals in Ukraine; Israel does the same in Gaza. The US response couldn’t be more different.
‘I have the prison inside me’: The emaciated Palestinian bodybuilder broken by Israel
Israel has manufactured an industrial-scale version of Jim Crow rape hoaxes
If Americans Knew Mobile Billboard Truck at Republican Convention
Col. Douglas MacGregor: US is under the control of Israel, likens Gaza to Warsaw Ghetto

https://israelpalestinenews.org/israel-killing-gaza-torture-rape-allegations-surface-day-304/

Jewish Supremacy: Mein Kampf in Reverse
Stated by Moshe “Bogie” Ya’alon, former Chief of Staff of the IDF, who also served as Israel’s Defence Minister

Karl Sanchez

I thought of titling this, Zionists: Nazis With Nukes, but that isn’t the kicker delivered by Alastair Crooke’s SCF essay, “The 1948 Irgun re-born?”, and in this morning’s chat with Judge Napolitano, “Alastair Crooke : Willful Western Blindness Over Israel.”

An alarming number of incidents perpetrated by the Zionists have occurred beginning with Netanyahu’s War Talk to the US Congress not quite two weeks ago. All will be reviewed by Crooke in his writing and chat, so I won’t replicate them here. There’s also been a very important development as Russia’s been shipping sophisticated EW and other gear to Iran for at least a week, and Shoigu is now in Tehran to sign the newest Strategic Alliance Treaty between Russia and Iran that was put on hold because of President Raisi’s death and the election of President Masoud Pezeshkian. That will likely be done today. Simplicius provides some details as to recent Russian actions about half-way through this essay. While today at The Cradle is an analytical essay that agrees with my thinking about what will transpire at some point, which I’ll reproduce below after Crooke’s essay. Again, it’s easier to comprehend Crooke’s chat with Judge Napolitano by reading his essay first the going to the chat. And yes, there’s another article I’ll be publishing dealing with what’s happening within the EU.

But before getting to Crooke’s essay, a brief note about the newest version of Black Monday for speculators. Here’s the opening to Sputnik’s article on the subject, “Why Did the Global Stock Market Crash And Who is to Blame?”:

The combination of "political mismanagement of debt, politicized fact-spinning, and resulting inflation" - all very real risks - have been factors contributing to serious market volatility, as the recent global market plummet has shown, Paul Goncharoff, a veteran financial analyst, told Sputnik. [Emphasis Original]

The emphasized “reasons” have been present for years but no massive selloff happened. The signs were visible for many months, primarily the instability of the Western banking system and its vulnerability to raised/rising interest rates after years of “free money” via the Zero Interest Rate Policy—ZIRP—instituted by many central banks, particularly Japan’s, where that’s been policy for many years. Within the Outlaw US Empire, the crisis is in commercial real estate, which was once a very low risk sector for bank loans, that’s been unended since Covid and the move to telecommuting, and we’ve already seen why banks are under treat from rising interest rates that’s caused the market value of bonds drop steeply causing some banks to go under due to bank runs by big depositors aware of such balance sheet frailty. Given such instability, almost any reason can be given for the selloff and is, but the main underlying reasons remain under the rug for the time being. Yes, much more could and ought to be said, but that’s all for now as we’ll now turn to one of the factors underlying the instability is the Zionist Genocide and its actions: Crooke’s essay:

The signposts are there for all to read: The West – in deliberately overlooking such explicit markers – cannot then complain, or escape, the ensuing consequences.

No, the ‘tin ear’ is not some new western derangement – a unique mass collapse of sanity – that we are living through. It is something worse: a return to a dogmatic, authoritarian version of truth which dissident physicist Eric Weinstein complains has (in the West) also destroyed true science – ignoring and silencing its most important dissident voices, whilst amply rewarding Science’s frauds.

Consider: Prime Minister Netanyahu addressed the U.S. Congress on 24 July saying, in an unrelieved Manichaean mode, that the West is facing an “axis of evil” (Iran and allies), which the U.S. must join in destroying. It was a call to participate in civilisational war.

His invitation was celebrated with 58 standing ovations from U.S. legislators.

Netanyahu returned home to a disaster in the Druze community on the Golan. Missile fragments had struck, killing and wounding many children playing football (the exact circumstances are still not clear). Western rationality however is perfectly capable to deduce firstly, that Majdal Shams lies in Occupied Syria; secondly, that the Druze community there remains overwhelmingly Syrian (rejecting Israeli citizenship) and largely pro-Syrian. And that they are neither Jews nor Israelis. The West seemingly cannot however, adduce the further very obvious conclusion: Why on earth would Hizbullah intentionally attack a Syrian community on Syrian land that largely is sympathetic to the Resistance?

They wouldn’t. Yet these obvious facts are completely ignored by a rationality that, as Weinstein suggests, actively prefers fraud to truth. Spokesman Kirby said Hizbullah had attacked children in northern Israel.

Israel’s Defence minister repeatedly says: “We don’t want war”. Western leaders parrot the same meme: No-one wants war. ‘We are fully confident that Israel’s response will be constrained and limited to military targets’. The White House: “In our view, there is no reason for some dramatic escalation in southern Lebanon and there is still time and space for diplomacy”.

So what then occurs? Two major assassinations: one in Beirut and the other in Tehran (i.e. to a guest on Iranian sovereign territory). Western leaders express their ‘concern’. The Hamas target in Tehran, Ismail Haniyeh, as the Qatari PM noted, was the key Gaza hostage negotiator.

This too will be overlooked, though Netanyahu’s intent to weave together Hamas, Hizbullah and Iran into a single ‘axis of evil’ cloth – thus speaking to his Join-Session of Congress thesis – must be evident even to a blinkered Washington.

Recall the new ‘equation’ that followed the assassination of a senior IRGC official in the Iranian Consulate in April 2024: Henceforth Iran will respond directly – and directly from Iran. Washington says it does not want war with Iran, yet the latter explicitly was what Netanyahu advocated. Did the legislators miss his point?

For nearly ten months, Israel has been unable to stabilize the situation along the northern border and allow for the return of displaced Israelis to their homes. Even if the Beirut strike doesn’t lead to wider war, restoring a negotiated stability on the Lebanese border is now beyond reach – as is too, a Gaza hostage deal. “How can mediation succeed when one party assassinates the negotiator on the other side”, Qatari PM al-Thani ruefully observed.

So too ‘overlooked’ in the West, will be that which happened in Israel on the same day the assassinations later took place: Right-wing vigilantes descended from their settlements, storming two military IDF bases. The anarchic scenes of mass break-ins, fomented by several members of the ruling coalition, some of whom took part in the forcible entries, sparked angry condemnation from Defence Minister Gallant.

The invasions were supported by one minister and several Knesset members seeking to free reservists that are suspected of aggravated abuse and forcible sodomy against a Palestinian detainee. According to a security source, the injured detainee was taken to a hospital with severe injuries, including to an intimate body part which left him unable to walk.

“The spectacle of military police officers coming to arrest our best heroes at Sde Teiman is nothing less than shameful”, said Ben Gvir, whose ministry controls the Israel Police and Israel Prison Service, said of the storming of the IDF post.

Yet the wider picture as related by Yossi Melman is:

“What is happening on the part of the nationalistic messianic Right with the backing, winking or silence of ministers and MKs of the Right is a “putsch”. The youth coming down from the hills of the ‘State of Judah’ to act with the same violent methods – used against the Palestinians – (but now) are being used against the state of Israel. MK Limor Son Har-Malech (Otzma Yehudit) said: “The people of Israel will fight against enemies from outside and enemies who try to destroy us at home” [those such as the Advocate General seeking to investigate the torture being practiced Sde Teiman]. The concept of the knife in the back and the betrayal at home echoes the voices in Germany after WWII”. [Should be WW1.]

Again, overlooked but not in the news: The situation at Sde Teiman was widely-known and said to be “more horrific than anything we’ve heard about Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo”. A UN report has detailed how Palestinians arbitrarily detained faced torture and mistreatment. The vigilantes from the settlements nevertheless described those committing the anal rape as “heroes” – and cast the IDF investigators as fifth columnists. Reports suggest that the perpetrators at Sde Teiman enjoy high level protection.

This account of systematic torture followed earlier revelations that the Israeli army had marked tens of thousands of Gazans as suspects for assassination, using an AI targeting system, called Lavender, with little human oversight and a permissive policy for casualties.

In the same vein, Right wing Cabinet ministers celebrated the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran on social media Wednesday morning, as: “This is the right way to purge the world of this filth”, Heritage Minister Amichay Eliyahu, a member of National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir’s far-right Otzma Yehudit party, tweeted:

“No more imaginary ‘peace’/surrender agreements, no more mercy for these dead men walking. The iron fist that will strike them is the one that will bring quiet and a modicum of comfort, and strengthen our ability to live in peace with those who seek peace. Haniyeh’s death makes the world a slightly better place”.

What then is this ‘truth’ that the West ignores and silences reality, whilst amplifying its narrative frauds? It is that the Israel which they presume to understand is now something very different. And that it has an epistemology at odds with mechanistic rationalism.

An eschatological Right-wing cult now holds the majority in cabinet – and wields a vigilante militia ready to attack the military establishment, and the Israeli state. No one was arrested for the attack and take-over of the two bases. They do not dare.

Moshe “Bogie” Ya’alon, former Chief of Staff of the IDF, who also served as Israel’s Defence Minister, had this to say in a video interview on the forces taking over in Israel:

“When you talk about Smotrich and Ben Gvir: They have a Rabbi. His name is Dov Lior. He is the Rabbi of the Jewish Underground, who intended to blow up the Dome of the Rock – and before that the buses in Jerusalem. Why? In order to hurry up the ‘Last War’. Do you [not] hear them talking in terms of the Last War; or of Smotrich’s concept of ‘subjugation’? Read the article he published in Shiloh in 2017. First of all, this concept rests on Jewish supremacy: Mein Kampf in reverse”.

“My hair stands on end when I say that – as he said it. I learned and grew up in the house of Holocaust survivors and ‘never again’. It is Mein Kampf in reverse: Jewish supremacy: and therefore [Smotrich] says: “My wife won’t go into a room with an Arab”. It is anchored in ideology. And then actually what he aspires to – as soon as possible – is to go to a big war. A war of Gog and Magog. How do you start the flames? A massacre like the [1994] Cave of the Patriarchs? Baruch Goldstein is a student of this Rabbi. Ben Gvir has hung up Goldstein’s picture [in his house]”.

“This is what goes into the decision-making process in the Israeli government”.

Rabbi Dov Lior has been described by Netanyahu as the “élite unit that leads Israel”, because of his influence and control over the settler forces. The 1948 Irgun, drawing heavily on the Mizrahim, is being reborn?

Isn’t it time that the western ruling structures raised their eyes from their reverie, and read the runes that manifest all around them? Some serious players don’t think as you westerners do; they seek Gog and Magog (the prophecy that “the children of Israel” will be victorious in the battle of Armageddon). That is what you risk. [Bolded Italics My Emphasis.]

(For the record, Ya’alon’s cited words above would usually be bolded, but I wanted it to be made clear that Crooke was emphasizing them too.)

A mostly hidden factor affecting what will ensue is the Zionists open alignment with the Ukrainian Nazis and their use of terrorism and haw that’s greatly affected the Zionists’s relations with Russia, which as I’ve explained before has a constitutional duty to defend Russians wherever they reside, which is why Russia has such a close relationship with Occupied Palestine. But such protection has limits, and the Russian government is well aware of the deterioration in relations. With that in mind and Russia’s (and China’s) alliance with Iran, besides the EW system I would think perhaps S-500 systems specifically to prevent any nuclear capable jet from getting within striking distance of Iran. However, I doubt any offensive weapons will be provided as Iran has plenty of its own. And in Moscow, ongoing talks at the MFA with regional ambassadors is virtually nonstop: Egypt, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, and Syria got public recognition via MFA’s website, but other backchannel conversations surely occurred. Today Putin met with the heads of Russia’s Legislature to talk about the last parliamentary session that just concluded; but when the cameras were off, I’m certain what Russia’s doing and might do further was discussed. The last formal meeting of Russia’s Security Council was on 2 August.

IMO, little more needs to be written by me about the Zionist’s Nazi nature, that Zionist ideology has always been Hitleresque—and before Hitler. Not well known or understood because the facts were immediately buried is that Occupied Palestine is a Terrorist State from its outset—it was made possible by terrorists who then became the leading members of what’s always been a Terrorist State when it comes to the treatment of those it was supposed to SHARE Palestine. The Outlaw US Empire saved Nazism in Western Ukraine and brought thousands of Nazis to the Western Hemisphere in the years after WW2, plus it sanitized Japanese Fascists and put them in charge of Korea and Taiwan. The Empire and its UK assistant—despite the latter bearing the brunt of Zionist Terrorism—facilitated what is essentially a Nazi state in West Asia for the control of the region’s hydrocarbon wealth. IMO, given its overt behavior and what we know of its covert behavior, we must conclude the Outlaw US Empire is also a Nazi-like organization well concealed by “Friendly Fascism,” but constantly showing its true face by its actions, and especially its primary doctrines: The Wolfowitz Doctrine and its mate Full Spectrum Dominance, where all are to be subjugated—EXCEPT—the Zionists. Their Genocide is rewarded with 58 standing ovations in the Empire’s Congress. That ought to tell the Global Majority exactly what the Outlaw US Empire is and what must be done with it—there can be no compromise with Nazism, just as there can be no compromise with Zionism as they are one and the same. Will Judge Napolitano and his crew of guests agree with my conclusion? And what about the Gym’s readers? What further evidence is required?

And now for The Cradle article, “Resistance Axis: a calculated, simultaneous strike on Israel:”

West Asia stands on a knife’s edge as the region’s Axis of Resistance prepares to retaliate against a series of recent Israeli assassinations and aggressions.

Iran, Hezbollah, and Yemen’s Ansarallah-aligned armed forces have vowed to make the occupation state pay a heavy price following the targeted killing of Hamas political bureau chief Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran and Hezbollah senior commander Fuad Shukr in southern Beirut.

Additionally, Israel bombed the Hodeidah port in Yemen following Sanaa’s successful ‘Yafa’ drone operation in Tel Aviv on 19 July.

An official from the Lebanese resistance has informed The Cradle that “The response will come at once from Iran, Hezbollah, and Yemen,” adding that the goal was to “inflict a painful blow to Israel which may not be achieved should separate retaliations be pursued.”

Executing the ‘Unity of Fronts’

Retaliation is all but certain and could happen within hours, according to senior US officials. A report yesterday by Axios claims that US Secretary of State Antony Blinken informed his G7 counterparts that the response could begin as early as within the next 24 hours.

Just yesterday, Ali al-Qahoum, a member of the political bureau of Ansarallah, emphasized that the response to Israel will not just come from Tehran:

We affirm our commitment to the battle, steadfastness, awareness, honor, and pride in standing with Palestine, the cause of the nation.

The critical question now is the scope and severity of the retaliation. Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah has promised a painful yet calculated blow to Tel Aviv. During Shukr’s funeral procession, Nasrallah warned that Israel had crossed the line, promising “a real and well-calculated response” – distinct from the cross-border operations Hezbollah has conducted against Israel since 8 October.

Flattening the Iron Dome

Other well-informed sources agree that the response could be coordinated, suggesting that retaliation from multiple fronts simultaneously is likely. They tell The Cradle that such an approach could take Israel’s primary air defense system, the Iron Dome, out of commission by preventing it from rapidly rearming. They believe this is achievable given Hezbollah’s capacity to launch a significant barrage of missiles and given Lebanon’s geographical proximity to potential Israeli targets.

These assessments appear to be consistent with those made by US officials who have warned that the Iron Dome could be overwhelmed by Hezbollah’s missile and drone arsenal should a full-scale war erupt.

Senior US military officials, meanwhile, have gone on the record cautioning that Washington would probably be unable to provide Tel Aviv with sufficient protection even in a single front, full-scale war with Hezbollah. US Joint Chief of Staff Charles Brown said as much in his remarks to the press in late June.

From our perspective, based on where our forces are, the short-range between Lebanon and Israel, it’s harder for us to be able to support them [Israel] in the same way we did in April [with Operation Truthful Promise].

Unwilling US support for Tel Aviv

Although much has been said about the US and its allies successfully thwarting Iran’s response to the Israeli attack on its consulate last April, it is noteworthy that all targeted Israeli military bases were hit during the Iranian retaliatory strikes. Operation Truthful Promise was intended more as a message, indicating that Tehran would no longer tolerate Israeli aggression against its interests.

US military reinforcements in the region may help intercept missiles and drones coming from Lebanon, while vassal state Jordan could also play a part as it did during Iran’s retaliatory strikes. However, this also makes US military assets and those of its partners legitimate targets for the Resistance Axis.

As former Pentagon analyst Michael Maloof explains to The Cradle:

Hezbollah would likely target US warships in the region that would take part in intercepting missiles directed at Israeli targets.

“As in 2006, I envision US involvement focused more on evacuating many of the 86,000 Americans now in Lebanon who would want to leave,” adds Maloof.

Washington’s top military officials also appear firmly opposed to being drawn into an active offensive role should a wider war erupt with Hezbollah, let alone a dreaded multi-front war. This stance is supported by statements from US Joint Chiefs of Staff Charles Brown, indicating the Pentagon’s limited willingness to protect the occupation state.

Note that Washington’s pledges to defend Israel have made no mention of potential offensive action, reflecting an American desire to avoid a wider war. Experts doubt the US will become heavily involved in any full-scale war, supported by public statements underscoring the importance of avoiding regional escalation – and voiced more privately, the desire to keep US military targets safe from retaliatory strikes.

Military risk and political calculations

As Brown said at the time, Washington’s main message is:

To think about the second order of effect of any type of operation into Lebanon, and how that might play out and how it impacts not just the region, but how it impacts our forces in regions as well.

The general – the most senior ranking US military official and the senior military advisor to the White House – was delivering a message that carries special significance amidst the recent developments.

By stating that an Israeli-initiated war on Lebanon put US troops at risk, Brown was essentially saying that a wider regional war was not seen as helping US interests by the Pentagon’s top brass.

Given these statements, it remains possible – though far from guaranteed – that the outgoing Biden administration may rein in Israel regardless of how painful a blow is delivered to it by the Axis of Resistance.

The upcoming US election in November is another factor that may prevent a regional conflagration. “The US getting more militarily involved with Israel,” warns Maloof, “would lead to riots in the streets of Chicago at the Democratic Convention later this month.”

These realities suggest a scenario where Washington might force Tel Aviv to absorb the Axis of Resistance’s retaliation, however severe it may be. [Bolded Italics My Emphasis]

The Outlaw US Empire’s political signals differ from what its military is saying. We know key weapons stocks are low for both Zionists and the Empire. The new complement of USN assets will boost what can be done from the sea until they become depleted and need to retire for their own safety. Also, after last April’s attack by Iran, Jordanian bases are now targets. Any USN vessel inside Persian Gulf that uses it AD systems to defend the Zionists will become a target; so, if the Empire doesn’t want a wider war it will need to remove such assets. Anticipation of the defense scheme affects the plan of attack.


The above map shows where the main actors are placed in the region. A multilayered, multi-vectored, synchronously timed attack from the four actors would be difficult to plan but even harder to defend against for there are an almost endless number of possibilities. One major question mark is, What will the Saudi’s do? Another, What will the Iraqis allow? In the latter, will there be active combat between Iraqi and Imperial forces that attempt to defend the Zionists that might grow into an attempt to forcibly eject all illegal Imperial forces? Yes, there’re many what ifs involved in the equation. And the last question: How long will the assault last? I’m prepared for it to last several days, to the point where all AD assets are used, and all Zionist and Imperial targets are exposed. Another question; What does Iran consider a legitimate target? The Knesset with all its Zionazis? The Ministry of Defense most certainly. What about known radical “settler” sites that IMO cannot be considered civilian? When what Crooke has revealed in his many essays and chats, the whole space of Occupied Palestine ought to be considered a target since its filled with Zionist/Nazi Genocidalists who differ none from Hitlerite Nazi Germans, or is that painting with too wide a brush?

And a Zionist attempt to nuke Iran must also be taken very seriously, which the Russian’s most certainly have. Medvedev’s conclusion that the only way to end this is via a major war is likely correct since as I’ve argued force will be required to make the Zionists obey Humanity’s Laws. Is there a way to keep that from occurring, or is it destined since the evil has proclaimed itself to be non-human, superior to all other beings because it was somehow chosen? As was stated, Mein Kampf all over again.


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https://substack.com/home/post/p-147378290

Israeli massacres, evacuation orders, torture continue unabated – Day 302
[email protected] August 5, 2024 ceasefire, evacuation orders, freedom flotilla, Gaza education, humanitarian aid, israeli mass surveillance, israeli settler violence, massacre, palestinian prisoner torture, pope francis
An aerial view of the makeshift tents set up in the coastal area as Palestinians, who left their homes due to Israeli attacks, try to survive under difficult conditions in Deir al-Balah, Gaza on May 16, 2024. (photo)
Bombs without warning, Gazans on the move again; more reports of prisoner torture; Gaza’s kids have lost one full school year; Israeli settlers storm Al Aqsa mosque; Israel adds new conditions to ceasefire proposal; Amazon provides storage for Israeli military mass surveillance; US military build-up in Middle East – “for peace”; VP contenders Shapiro & Pritzker are Israel partisans; more.

By IAK staff, from reports.

At least 19 killed when Israel bombs several camps in besieged Gaza Strip


Middle East Monitor reports: At least 19 Palestinians were reportedly killed and several others injured on Sunday in an Israeli attack targeting various areas of the besieged Gaza Strip.

Separately, Israeli army vehicles stationed on the eastern border of the central governorate fired intensively at eastern areas of the Bureij and Maghazi camps.

Children among 30 killed after Israel bombs two schools in Gaza without warning

Al Jazeera reports: At least 30 people have been killed and many others injured in Israeli strikes on two United Nations-run schools in the west of Gaza City.

The latest death toll was reported to Al Jazeera by Dr Marwan al-Hams, the director of hospitals in the Gaza Ministry of Health.

According to the Palestinian Civil Defense in Gaza, 80 percent of those killed and injured in the strikes on Sunday on the Hassan Salama and al-Nasr schools were children.

Reporting from Deir el-Balah, Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud said that the schools, which have been used as shelters by displaced Palestinians, have been severely damaged.

“This is the same exact scenario that we’ve seen in the past few days. What we know for a fact right now is that there is [a] concentration of attacks on evacuation centers. What’s really concerning about that is … that the Israeli military is not giving any prior warning to people inside these evacuation centers,” Mahmoud said.

The correspondent noted that most of the buildings used as shelters for the displaced in Gaza are schools, as they are the only large spaces available now to house a significant number of people.

“This is happening in an unpredictable way, causing severe casualties and increasing the trauma of a population already displaced in some cases up to five, six or seven times across the northern part of the Gaza Strip,” Mahmoud said.

Sunday’s attacks followed the bombing of a school on Saturday by the Israeli army. Following Sunday’s attacks, at least 15 people were killed in Israeli air raids on the Hamama school in the Sheikh Radwan neighbohood in Gaza City, which was sheltering displaced Palestinians.



Israel orders Palestinians to leave from southern, southeastern parts of Khan Younis

Al Jazeera reports: The Israeli military has issued a new order for Palestinians to leave the southern and southeastern parts of Khan Younis in Gaza, according to Al Jazeera’s Hind Khoudary in Deir el-Balah.

The residents of these areas were warned that “any presence of civilians in these areas is dangerous and of high risk”, she said.

It was not clear where people were expected to flee, as there is no safe place left in the enclave.

Earlier this month, the United Nations said more than 86 percent of Gaza was already affected by Israel’s so-called evacuation orders, with most people asked to live in small “safe zones” that repeatedly come under Israeli attacks.

Palestinian detainees describe torture in Israel’s Ofer Prison

Al Jazeera reports: Three Palestinians from Gaza who are being held in Israel’s Ofer Prison have recounted abuse and mistreatment, according to the Palestinian Commission of Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs.

Mohammed Jamous, 44; Fadi Ayad, 39; and Fadi Howaydi, 38, told the commission’s lawyer who visited them last week that they were stripped of their clothes, beaten, tortured, bound and blindfolded.

The detainees described Israeli soldiers as “rabid beasts” who took pleasure in their suffering.

“We were turned into prey to these monsters, who enjoyed our hunger, thirst, screams and illnesses. We still do not believe that we are still alive,” a prisoner was quoted as saying.

The abuse, according to the detainees, began immediately upon their detention in Gaza and continued through transportation in military vehicles where they faced insults, degradation and torture.

“Today, we are all sick,” a detainee said, according to the commission. “Our bodies are exhausted, and we have become prey to illness and injury. No medical treatment or medication is provided. Despite these dire conditions, we cling to the hope of returning to our families alive.”

Israel extends detention of 5 soldiers accused of sexually assaulting Gaza prisoner


Middle East Monitor reports: An Israeli military court yesterday extended the detention of five soldiers accused of sexually assaulting a Palestinian prisoner from Gaza in the Sde Teiman detention facility, according to local media.

Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper said that the military court ruled that the men could be held until tomorrow. They are accused of sexually and physically assaulting a Palestinian prisoner from the Gaza Strip.

The newspaper quoted Judge Lt. Col. Toby Hart as saying that there is a reasonable and solid basis to assume that the detainee was harmed, and that there is reasonable suspicion that the five harmed the detainee together.

RECOMMENDED READING: Hostages of Israeli revenge in the Gaza Strip: Testimonies of 100 released Palestinian detainees reveal crimes of torture, cruel treatment.



A year of silence in Gaza’s classrooms: the urgent need for educational revival

ReliefWeb reports: Children in Gaza have lost one year of education. As of 30 July 2024, all the 625,000 enrolled students in Gaza have lost one full scholastic year.

39,000 students missed the Tawjihi (12th grade official exams) for the first time in decades. This means none of them can transition to higher education, and the majority of them may never return to school again.

In place of being full of children eager to learn, school buildings are housing displaced families desperately seeking safety, when they are not being damaged. Mattresses and blankets fill classrooms and hallways; desks are repurposed as walls and wardrobes, and playgrounds are filled with tents and tarpaulins.

This places a massive strain on the limited WASH facilities. At the same time, overcrowding contributes to an unhygienic environment and rapid spread of disease, increased protection risks due to lack of privacy, and damage to furniture and equipment.

These conditions have had a significant negative impact on the mental health and psychosocial well-being of children, teachers, and caregivers, as well as severely harming the ability of children in Gaza to exercise their right to learn.

As of 30 July, according to the Ministry of Education and Higher Education (MoEHE) – State of Palestine, 9,211 students and 397 educational staff members have been killed by the Israeli forces, while more than 14,237 students and 2,246 teachers have been injured since 7 October in the Gaza Strip.

The educational infrastructure in Gaza has also been significantly affected with 92.9% of schools sustained some level of damage to their buildings, including Direct hit, Damaged, and Likely damaged.

At least 84.6% of schools require full reconstruction or significant rehabilitation before resuming schooling. One-third of directly hit or heavily damaged schools are UN-run schools under UNRWA’s jurisdiction.

The Israeli military claims its attacks are targeting ‘terrorists’, but most victims have been Gaza’s children
The Israeli military claims its attacks are targeting ‘terrorists’, but most victims have been Gaza’s children (photo)
At least 10,000 Israeli soldiers killed, injured in Gaza war: Report

Andalou Agency reports: At least 10,000 Israeli soldiers have been killed and injured since the outbreak of the Gaza conflict last Oct. 7, according to Israeli media on Sunday.

Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper said some 1,000 soldiers are transferred every month to the Defense Ministry’s rehabilitation department due to injuries sustained in the Gaza war.

“The army is suffering from a shortage of at least 10,000 soldiers killed or wounded during the long months of fighting in the Gaza Strip,” the daily said.

The newspaper criticized the Knesset (Israel’s parliament) for going on summer break from July 22 until mid-October without passing legislation to extend mandatory military service.

According to the newspaper, female soldiers serving in Israel-occupied Syrian Golan Heights were unexpectedly informed of an additional four-month extension of their service.

Illegal Israeli settlers storm Al-Aqsa Mosque amid rise in tensions

Andalou Agency reports: Under Israeli police protection, a mob of illegal Israeli settlers stormed Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied East Jerusalem on Sunday.

Israeli forces and illegal settlers entered the flashpoint mosque performing religious rituals while Israeli police established checkpoints around the Old City of East Jerusalem, restricting Palestinian access to the mosque, according to official Palestinian news agency Wafa.

Separately, the Palestinian Awqaf and Religious Affairs Ministry released a monthly report detailing increased violations at Al-Aqsa Mosque and Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron, reporting that Israel conducted 23 raids on Al-Aqsa Mosques this July.

The report also highlighted that Israeli forces had obstructed the call to prayer at Ibrahimi Mosque 43 times last month and prevented Palestinians from entering the mosque.

The illegal settler incursion came amid rising tensions across the occupied West Bank as Israel continued its brutal offensive on the Gaza Strip, which has killed nearly 40,000 people since last October following a Hamas attack.

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Israel blocking and letting aid rot ‘first phase of its genocide,’: Turkish FM

Al Jazeera reports: Turkey’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan says Israel’s practice of blocking aid, killing aid workers, blocking evacuations, and allowing humanitarian supplies to rot are crimes against humanity and the “first phase of the genocide”.

His remarks came after a visit to Egypt’s El Arish port and the Rafah border.

Fidan urged the global community not to remain silent on “Israel’s oppression” and called for “greater efforts” to ensure that aid reaches Gaza without being obstructed or interrupted.

Tel Aviv: Two Israelis Killed, Three Injured, Perpetrator Killed

IMEMC reports: Two Israelis were killed and three others were injured, on Sunday morning, in the city of Holon, south of Tel Aviv in central Israel, while the perpetrator of the attack, a Palestinian man, was killed by occupation police.

Media sources said that a Palestinian man carried out a stabbing attack in the city of Holon, south of Tel Aviv, killing two Israelis and injuring three others, two seriously.

Sources added that an Israeli police officer shot the Palestinian perpetrator, critically injuring him; he later died.

Media sources identified the perpetrator as 35-year-old Ammar Rizq Kamel Odeh, from the central West Bank city of Salfit, while police later arrested a Palestinian man accused of assisting the perpetrator in the attack.

After the attack, Israeli forces closed the northern entrance to the city of Salfit with an iron gate, and prevented Palestinian citizens from entering or leaving the city.

Later, the army invaded the city of Salfit, and stormed the family home of the slain perpetrator, detained and interrogated his family members, and prevented press crews from the area.

Ben-Gvir renews call for more Israeli civilians to take up arms

Al Jazeera reports: In the context of the recent stabbing, Israeli national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir said that he’s calling for more civilians to take up arms and use them. This has been quite a controversial policy that he’s had throughout this war.

He has essentially expedited the way that a regular, average person can obtain a weapon in Israel, and it’s been something that has caused a lot of backlash.

He’s even distributed weapons to people in the occupied West Bank, including settlers.

Israel adds new conditions to Gaza ceasefire proposal


Middle East Monitor reports: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu added a new condition to the proposed prisoner exchange deal, including the deportation of about 150 Palestinian prisoners, according to Israeli media.

Israel’s Channel 13 quoted unnamed informed sources as saying that Netanyahu added several new conditions to the prisoner exchange deal proposal, including the deportation of several Palestinian prisoners who will be released from prisons in Israel under the terms of the deal.

The sources told the Israeli channel that these 150 prisoners are accused of killing Israelis.

They noted that Netanyahu proposes deporting them to countries such as Turkiye or Qatar and banning them from ever returning to the Gaza Strip or the occupied West Bank.

Israel seizes $26m tax funds meant for Palestinian Authority

Al Jazeera reports: Far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has ordered the seizure of about 100 million shekels ($26m) of tax funds meant to be transferred to the Palestinian Authority.

He says the money will be given to the families of Israeli victims of “terror” inflicted by Palestinians.

“The fight against terrorism is not only a military fight but a combined fight that includes a war against the wild incitement of the Palestinian Authority and the terrorist funds which it directs from its budget to the families of terrorists,” Smotrich wrote in a post on X.

“We will continue to protect the security of the citizens of Israel and fight with all the tools at our disposal against terrorism and its supporters.”

‘Order from Amazon’: How tech giants are storing mass data for Israel’s war

+972 Magazine reports: A new investigation by +972 and Local Call can reveal that the Israeli army has in fact stored some intelligence information collected via the mass surveillance of Gaza’s population on servers managed by Amazon’s AWS. The investigation can also reveal that certain cloud providers supplied a wealth of AI capabilities and services to Israeli army units since the start of the Gaza war.

Military sources emphasized to +972 and Local Call that the scope of intelligence collected from the surveillance of all Palestinian residents of Gaza is so large that it cannot be stored on military servers alone.

Three sources who took part in Israeli army attacks said that it was used in a number of cases to provide “supplementary information” ahead of airstrikes against suspected military operatives, some of which killed many civilians.

In particular, according to intelligence sources, much more extensive storage capabilities and processing power were needed to keep billions of audio files (as opposed to just textual information or metadata), which compelled the army to turn to the cloud services offered by tech companies.

As +972 and Local Call revealed in a previous investigation, the Israeli army authorized the killing of “hundreds of civilians” in attacks against senior Hamas commanders at the level of brigade commander and sometimes even battalion commander. In some of these cases, security sources explained, Amazon’s cloud was operationalized.

Sources said that the AWS-based system is particularly useful for Israeli intelligence because it can hold information “on everyone,” with no storage limitations.

(Read the full article here.)

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Turkiye blocks Freedom Flotilla setting sail for Gaza


Middle East Monitor reports: Turkish authorities have blocked the new Freedom Flotilla, carrying urgent and lifesaving aid to Gaza in an attempt to break Israel’s siege on the Strip, from departing Istanbul, organisers reported.

The Freedom Flotilla Coalition, comprising multiple humanitarian and pro-Palestinian groups, issued a statement on Saturday announcing that they had been awaiting approval from the Istanbul port authority to set sail.

“It has now become clear that the Turkish government will not grant permission,” the statement said.

The coalition added that the government did not offer “any explanation” for preventing the flotilla to sail, but placed the blame on “intense pressure from the United States, the United Kingdom, and perhaps other NATO countries that are strongly allied with Israel.”

In May 2010, the six-vessel Freedom Flotilla I was intercepted by the Israeli navy, with Israeli commandos boarding the Turkish lead ship, the Mavi Marmara, opening fire and killing nine activists.

Pope Francis says assassinations ‘never a solution’

Al Jazeera reports: Pope Francis has once again appealed to all sides to resume negotiations to achieve an “immediate ceasefire in Gaza and on all fronts”.

The pope also denounced “attacks, even targeted ones, and killings” in an address to thousands of pilgrims and tourists in St Peter’s Square.

Such attacks “can never be a solution”, he said, adding that they “do not help us walk in the path of justice, the path of peace, but generate even more hatred and revenge”.

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US says military moves in Middle East aimed at de-escalating tensions


Reuters reports: The US is deploying additional military might in the Middle East as a defensive measure with a goal of de-escalating tensions in the region, a White House official said on Sunday.

US President, Joe Biden, will convene his national security team in the situation room on Monday to discuss developments in the Middle East, the White House said, adding that he would speak with Jordan’s King Abdullah as well.

US news service, Axios, reported that US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, told his counterpart from G7 countries that Iran and Hezbollah could start attacking Israel as early as Monday, citing three sources briefed on the call. But Blinken, according to Axios, said it was unclear how Iran and Hezbollah would attack and did not know the exact timing.

“The overall goal is to turn the temperature down in the region, deter and defend against those attacks, and avoid regional conflict,” Jonathan Finer, the White House’s deputy National Security Adviser, said on CBS‘ “Face the Nation” program.

VP contenders Shapiro & Pritzker are Israel partisans


Governor Josh Shapiro takes stand in support of Israel. “Israel is a special place – it’s a place where some of us have made friends and spent meaningful time.” – October 18, 2023. By that time, Israeli forces had killed 5,791 people in Gaza since Oct. 7 (including at least 2,055 children (800 more missing) and 1,119 women, and at least 95 in the West Bank); 17,636 injured (15,898 in Gaza – 70% of them women and children – and over 1,738 in the West Bank). About 1.4 million people had been displaced. (screenshot)
Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz reports that Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro “has made his Jewish identity central to his career…. ‘Israel not only has a right to defend itself, it has a responsibility to combat Hamas,’ he said recently.”

Ha’aretz continues: “His presence on the ticket would bolster its already historic Jewish presence – Harris’ husband Doug Emhoff is the first Jewish spouse of a U.S. president or vice president in American history.”

“Upon graduating from Georgetown University Law Center, Shapiro worked on Capitol Hill for Jewish lawmakers like Michigan Sen. Carl Levin and Florida Rep. Peter Deutsch, who moved to the Israeli city Ra’anana after failing in his 2004 Senate bid.”

“He has also bucked growing Democratic criticism of Israel’s conduct in Gaza in recent months, insisting to the Jewish Democratic Council of America that “Israel not only has a right to defend itself, I think Israel has a responsibility to combat Hamas head-on and to defeat Hamas.”

Jewish Insider reports: In The New York Times, pollster and former Clinton adviser Mark Penn endorses Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, writing that he “would be the highest-ranking Jewish official in U.S. history. He has supported Israel and has been strongly critical of the campus protests.”

The Philadelphia Inquirer reports He volunteered in the IDF.

Salon reports: “On the contentious issue of Israel’s relentless war against civilians in Gaza, Shapiro sounds much less bothered by the lethal violence than by U.S. activists for Palestinian lives, many of whom he has demonized.”

The New york Times reports that Shapiro “has been unapologetic in his love for Israel; he has visited often and even proposed to his wife there.”


J.B. Pritzker speaks at Israeli Solidarity Gathering on Oct. 10. (screenshot)
Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker also has a long history of support for Israel.

On Oct 10, he spoke at a Jewish United Fund sponsored Israeli Solidarity Gathering, saying: “We need to stand with Israel.”

The Capital News report on the event noted: “Israeli airstrikes have killed at least 800 and wounded more than 4,000 Palestinians in the days following the initial attack.

“Pritzker’s address included a message of support for the Israeli military.

“We pray today for the strength and safety of the men and women of the Israeli Defense Forces as they embark on this most difficult and important mission,” the governor said. “Each step of the way they should know, and the people of Israel should know, that America and Illinois unequivocally stands with them in their battle to end the ongoing Hamas attacks. We stand with Israel.”

By then, Israeli forces had killed 900 in Gaza (over 18 in West Bank), injured 4,500 in Gaza (100 in West Bank), killed 260 children and 230 women; and displaced: 200,000. A large part of Gaza City’s Rimal neighborhood was reduced to rubble after hours of airstrikes. Residents found buildings torn in half or demolished to mounds of concrete and rebar. Cars were flattened and trees burned out on residential streets transformed into moonscapes.” Israel had impsed a ‘total’ blockade on Gaza, including ban on admission of food, electricity and fuel.

On Oct 17 Pritzker announced tax relief for individuals and businesses affected by the attacks that took place in Israel.

In January he opposed a Chicago resolution backing a cease-fire.

The Times of Israel reports: “J.B. Pritzker is the scion of a wealthy Jewish hotelier family long involved in Democratic politics. His sister Penny, a major donor to Barack Obama’s presidential campaigns.”

The Pritzker family (net worth: $32.5B) is one of the wealthiest families in the U.S. It is known for being pro-Israel. The Chicago Tribune reported in 1985: “The Pritzker family buys $500,000 worth of Israel bonds each year and, besides their other philanthropies, also makes donations to universities and institutions in Israel.

JTA reports that J.B. Pritzker “has served on the board of AIPAC.” [Also see this.] He is “the scion of the Hyatt hotel family with deep Jewish community ties.” [His net worth is $3.5B]

Pritzker emceed a fundraiser for Friends of the IDF in 2013.

MORE NEWS:

IMEMC Daily Reports.

Middle East Monitor: Shin Bet prepares underground bunker to protect Netanyahu, senior officials from possible Iran attack

Middle East Monitor: Could the US-China rivalry save the peace process in the Middle East?

The New Arab: Palestine Authority presents Gaza day-after plan, while US truce draft allows Israel to continue war

STATISTICS OCTOBER 7 – AUGUST 4:

Palestinian death toll from October 7 – August 4: at least 40,186* (39,623 in Gaza* – 11,445 women (30%), 16,251 children as of July 22. [The Ministry’s figures have been contested by the Israeli authorities, although they have been accepted as accurate by Israeli intelligence services, the UN, and WHO. These data are supported by independent analyses, comparing changes in the number of deaths of UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) staff with those reported by the Ministry, which found claims of data fabrication implausible.]

This is expected to be a significant undercount since thousands of those killed have yet to be identified – and at least 604 in the West Bank (~140 children). This does not include an estimated 10,000 more still buried under rubble (4,900 women and children). Euro-Med Monitor reports 46,848 Palestinian deaths.

Lancet: “Applying a conservative estimate of four indirect deaths per one direct death9 to the 37,396 deaths reported, it is not implausible to estimate that up to 186 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza.

Ralph Nader earlier estimated 200,000 Palestinians may have been killed in Gaza.

At least 45 Palestinians have died in Israeli prisons (27 from Gaza, 18 from West Bank).
At least 41 Palestinians have died due to malnutrition**.
About 1.7 million, or 75% of Gaza’s population are currently displaced.
2.15 million (out of total population of 2.3 million) are projected to face Crisis or worse levels of food insecurity.
Palestinian injuries from October 7 – August 4: at least 96,818 (including at least 91,469 in Gaza and 5,420 in the West Bank, including 830 children). [It remains unknown how man Americans are among the casualties in Gaza.]

Reported Israeli death toll from October 7 – August 4: ~1,486 (~1,139 on October 7, 2023, of which ~32 were Americans, and ~36 were children); 331 military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza; 16 in the West Bank) and~8,730 injured.

Times of Israel reports: The IDF listed 41 soldiers killed due to friendly fire in Gaza and other military-related accidents – nearly 16%.

NOTE: It is unknown at this time how many of the deaths and injuries in Israel on October 7 were caused by Israeli soldiers.

*Previously, IAK did not include 471 Gazans killed in the Al Ahli hospital blast since the source of the projectile was being disputed. However, given that much evidence points to Israel as the culprit, Israel had previously bombed the hospital and has attacked many others, Israel is prohibiting outside experts from investigating the scene, and since the UN and other agencies are including the deaths from the attack in their cumulative totals, if Americans knew is now also doing so.**

Euro-Med Monitor reports that Gaza’s elderly are dying at an alarmingly high rate. The majority die at home and are buried either close to their residences or in makeshift graves dispersed across the Strip. There are currently more than 140 such cemeteries. Additionally, according to Euromed, thousands have died from starvation, malnourishment, and inadequate medical care; these are considered indirect victims as they were not registered in hospitals.

† For most of the conflict, women and children accounted for about 70% of deaths in Gaza, with children making up a little over 40% of those killed, according to official statistics.

Find previous daily casualty figures and daily news updates here.

Hover over each bar for exact numbers.
Source: IsraelPalestineTimeline.org
Human rights reports on Israel-Palestine (regularly updated)
More dead children. More BBC ‘news’ channelling Israeli propaganda as its own
U.S. media downplays and ignores ICJ ruling declaring Israeli occupation illegal
Israeli soldiers tell story of savage cruelty in Gaza – one given blessing by the West
Searching for Gaza’s missing children
What Would You Do With An Extra $320 Million?
Assassination of Haniyeh an intentional, dangerous escalation – Parsi, Macgregor
When Israel Burned Refugees Alive, Establishment Media Called It a ‘Tragic Accident’
Israel has turbocharged West Bank housing demolitions under the cover of war
Western media ignores Israeli confirmation of Hannibal Directive on 7 Oct
US Should Arrest Benjamin Netanyahu When He’s in Washington
Airwars investigation: Israeli airstrikes uniquely lethal (video)
Hesen Jabr paid the price of conscience
Gaza genocide denial
Why the news media’s job is to groom us
‘Disappeared, buried, detained’: The horrors of Gaza’s missing children
Hundreds of social media influencers attend Israel strategy summit in NYC
Supporting Israel Is Big Business in the U.S. for Israel partisans
Toys, spices, sewing machines: the items Israel banned from entering Gaza
Synopsis of ICJ’s decision on Israeli occupation, reactions, and take-aways
Russia attacks hospitals in Ukraine; Israel does the same in Gaza. The US response couldn’t be more different.
‘I have the prison inside me’: The emaciated Palestinian bodybuilder broken by Israel
Israel has manufactured an industrial-scale version of Jim Crow rape hoaxes
If Americans Knew Mobile Billboard Truck at Republican Convention
Col. Douglas MacGregor: US is under the control of Israel, likens Gaza to Warsaw Ghetto

https://israelpalestinenews.org/israeli-massacres-evacuation-orders-torture-continue-unabated-day-302/

New worries as polio virus detected in Gaza sewage – Day 285
[email protected] July 19, 2024 American Federation of Teachers, Amnesty International, democratic platform, gaza pier, healthcare in gaza, houthis, humanitarian aid, icc arrest warrant, itamar ben gvir, microsoft, mike johnson, Netanyahu, netanyahu speech, oxfam report, palestinian statehood, polio virus, republican national convention, torture
The polio virus has been detected in Gaza's sewage, which flows through areas with displaced persons and residential zones due to infrastructure destruction, and “represents a new health crisis.” (photo)
Polio risk added to long list of crises in Gaza; Amnesty speaks out on Israeli torture, Oxfam speaks out on Israeli water weaponization; LA may hire ex-IDF soldiers to patrol streets; 1,000+ attacks on Palestinian healthcare; Ben Gvir’s provocative prayer visit to Al Aqsa; Netanyahu nixes children’s hospital for Gaza kids; ICC arrest warrants expected soon; Republican and Democratic parties scramble to ingratiate with Israel; much more.

By IAK staff, from reports.

New health crisis unfolds in Gaza as poliovirus found in sewage

Andalou Agency reports: A new health crisis unfolded in the bombarded Gaza Strip with the detection of poliovirus in sewage, the Gaza Health Ministry revealed on Thursday.

A ministry statement noted that “tests on sewage samples, conducted in coordination with UNICEF, confirmed the presence of the poliovirus.”

The statement added that the presence of the virus in sewage, which flows through areas with displaced persons and residential zones due to infrastructure destruction, “represents a new health crisis.”

The situation is exacerbated by severe overcrowding, scarce and contaminated water supplies, accumulated garbage, and the Israeli blockade on hygiene supplies.

The ministry warned that the detection of the virus in sewage puts thousands of residents at risk of contracting polio.

UNICEF and other organizations have been warning for months of the possibility of an outbreak if they weren’t able to get on top of vaccination programs and decontamination efforts in Gaza. But that has been impossible due to Israel’s ongoing war and the limits imposed by the Israeli military on the entry to Gaza of hygiene kits, vaccines and other essential medicines.

Amnesty Int’l calls on Israel to end mass incommunicado detention and torture of Palestinians from Gaza

From Amnesty’s website: Israeli authorities must end their indefinite incommunicado detention of Palestinians from the occupied Gaza Strip, without charge or trial under the Unlawful Combatants law, in flagrant violation of international law, said Amnesty International.

The organization documented the cases of 27 Palestinian former detainees, including five women, 21 men and a 14-year-old boy, who were detained for periods of up to four and a half months without access to their lawyers or any contact with their families, in connection with this law. All those interviewed by Amnesty International said that during their incommunicado detention, which in some cases amounted to enforced disappearance, Israeli military, intelligence and police forces subjected them to torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.

The Unlawful Combatants Law grants the Israeli military sweeping powers to detain anyone from Gaza that they suspect of engagement in hostilities against Israel or posing a threat to state security for indefinitely renewable periods without having to produce evidence to substantiate the claims.

“While international humanitarian law allows for the detention of individuals on imperative security grounds in situations of occupation, there must be safeguards to prevent indefinite or arbitrary detention and torture and other ill-treatment. This law blatantly fails to provide these safeguards. It enables rampant torture and, in some circumstances, institutionalizes enforced disappearance,” said Agnès Callamard, Secretary General of Amnesty International.

“Our documentation illustrates how the Israeli authorities are using the Unlawful Combatants Law to arbitrarily round up Palestinian civilians from Gaza and toss them into a virtual black hole for prolonged periods without producing any evidence that they pose a security threat and without minimum due process. Israeli authorities must immediately repeal this law and release those arbitrarily detained under it.”

(Read the full statement here.)



Oxfam report: Water War Crimes: How Israel has weaponized water in its military campaign in Gaza

Oxfam’s new 66-page report, released Wednesday, documents how since October, Israel has systematically reduced the water available in Gaza by 94%, with just 4.74 liters per resident obtainable each day—less than a third of the recommended minimum amount in emergencies.

An average of five of Gaza’s water and sanitation sites have been taken out of service every three days, Oxfam found, reducing water production from sources in the Gaza Strip by 84% by late May.

Gaza City, the enclave’s most populous city before it was largely destroyed by the bombardment, has lost 88% of its water wells.

With Israel blocking fuel deliveries as well as food, medical, and other necessary aid, 100% of the city’s water desalination plants have been put out of service, making it impossible to treat seawater and brackish water to make it safe to drink.

Seventy percent of sewage pumps and 100% of wastewater treatment plants have also been destroyed throughout the enclave.

(Read the full report here, or a summary here.)



West Bank – Israeli military drops threatening leaflets over Jenin camp

The Israeli military has reportedly dropped leaflets in the Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, threatening to kill wanted young men if they do not surrender themselves.

The leaflets, dropped via reconnaissance aircraft, were dropped near a mosque on Mahyoub Street in the camp.

The Jenin area has long been a center of Palestinian resistance to Israel’s occupation in the West Bank and has witnessed some of the most intense fighting between Israeli forces and Palestinian armed groups since October 7.

L.A. city council considers funding former IDF soldiers to patrol its streets

The Intercept reports: The Los Angeles City Council is considering whether to give public funds to private, armed security patrols to protect its religious communities, following a protest against the marketing of West Bank settlement properties at an LA synagogue last month that turned violent.

Anti-war group CodePink, which organizes pro-Palestine protests, said of the event, “The protest was solely focused on the illegal sale of Palestinian land. We respect religious practices and make sure our actions are directed toward real estate activities, not against worshippers,” No religious services were scheduled at the time of the real estate event.

Pro-Israel counter protesters were also present at the same time, and reportedly used violence and racial slurs.

Codepink claimed that Los Angeles police employed a double standard against the pro-Palestine protestors.

In the immediate wake of the incident, city council members introduced a motion to give $1 million to several Jewish security organizations that would expand their work around Jewish schools, religious institutions, and neighborhoods – in spite of the fact that the protest was not against Jews.

Magen Am, a nonprofit that runs armed patrol services and firearm training programs for the Jewish community, was named as the recipient of $350,000 in the motion. The group is largely made up of former Israeli soldiers, along with U.S. military veterans, according to the group’s website and social media posts.

The majority of the former Israel Defense Forces soldiers in the group are “lone soldiers,” according to several reports, the term for individuals with no direct ties to the state of Israel who immigrate there to serve in the nation’s military.

The city council has since introduced a new motion, which would give $2 million to various faith groups that want to hire additional security and does not mention Magen Am or any recipients by name. But LA activists are still concerned that city funds will go to an armed group with hard-line political stances.

“The fact that Magen Am was even named in that original motion as a recipient of money, that exposes the intention,” said Miguel Camnitzer, an activist with Jewish Voice for Peace. The group is alarmed that city leaders are choosing to fund individuals who served a military that commits ethnic cleansing and genocide of the Palestinian people in Gaza and the West Bank.

“It’s the same military that’s enacting this genocide, and we’re going to have them patrolling our streets with guns seems wild to me,” Camnitzer said. The group also notes that the new motion does not include any provisions for keeping the recipients of city money accountable to the public interest. “We’re talking about essentially a private militia that can use force and detain people, and has no accountability.”

(Read the full article here.)

Over 1,000 attacks on healthcare in Occupied Palestinian Territory since October

ReliefWeb reports: The World Health Organization (WHO) has registered more than 1,000 attacks on healthcare facilities in the Occupied Palestinian Territory since the October 7 terror attacks in Israel sparked the on-going war in Gaza, the agency’s top official in the region said on Wednesday.

In a press briefing, Dr. Rik Peeperkorn, WHO representative for the West Bank and Gaza, told journalists there are currently no functional hospitals in the enclave’s southernmost city of Rafah, following Israel’s recent offensive there.

The availability of hospital beds has drastically declined, dropping from 3,500 before the conflict erupted, to just 1,400 today, he added.

He said 600 of those 1,400 are being provided by field hospitals “so currently from the Ministry of Health and NGO fixed hospitals, there’s only 800 hospital beds in service from the 3,500, plus 600 field hospital beds, for a population of 2.2 million people”.

The WHO official also highlighted the urgency of allowing critically ill patients to leave Gaza, stating that around 10,000 patients still require urgent evacuation, half of whom are suffering from severe trauma – including spinal injuries and amputations.

Palestinians start to fix and restore the Shifa Hospital after being heavily damaged by Israeli attacks and demolished some parts to prepare it to service again in Gaza City, Gaza on June 05, 2024
Palestinians start to fix and restore the Shifa Hospital after being heavily damaged by Israeli attacks and demolished some parts to prepare it to service again in Gaza City, Gaza on June 05, 2024 (photo)
Israeli legislature votes overwhelmingly against Palestinian statehood, days before PM’s US trip

Times of Israel reports: The Knesset late Wednesday voted overwhelmingly to pass a resolution rejecting the establishment of a Palestinian state.

The initiative was passed just days before Netanyahu’s visit to the US to address a joint session of Congress and meet with President Joe Biden at the White House. The move was likely to further irk Democrats uncomfortable with embracing an Israeli government that increasingly rejects a two-state solution.

The resolution — passed 68-9 — altogether rejects the establishment of a Palestinian state, even as part of a negotiated settlement with Israel.

“The Knesset of Israel firmly opposes the establishment of a Palestinian state west of Jordan. The establishment of a Palestinian state in the heart of the Land of Israel will pose an existential danger to the State of Israel and its citizens, perpetuate the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and destabilize the region,” the resolution stated.

NOTE: The reality is the opposite of what the resolution states: rather than a Palestinian state being created in the “heart of the land of Israel,” the state of Israel was created in the heart of historic Palestine.

Al-Aqsa Mosque stormed by far-right Israeli minister for fifth time

Middle East Monitor reports: Israel’s far-right National Security Minister stormed into Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem yesterday, accompanied by a group of Israeli soldiers. Palestinian worshippers were barred from entering the site while Itamar Ben-Gvir was there.

“I came here, to the most important place of the State of Israel [sic] and to the people of Israel, to pray for the return of the abductees to their home,” said right-ring extremist Ben-Gvir, “but without an illegitimate deal and surrender.” This was a reference to any ceasefire and prisoner exchange deal with the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas, which he opposes.

The incident on Wednesday marked the fifth time that Ben-Gvir has raided the mosque by force since becoming an Israeli minister in December 2022. The leader of the far-right Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Power) party is well-known for encouraging Israeli settlers to storm Al-Aqsa.

Al-Aqsa Mosque compound is the third-holiest site in the world for Islam and Muslims. Jews call the area the Temple Mount, and there are plans to knock down the mosque and other Islamic buildings across the Noble Sanctuary, including the iconic Dome of the Rock Mosque, and build a temple in their place.



Israeli government shelves plans to block terror convicts from running for Knesset: Report

Middle East Eye reports: The Israeli government has shelved plans to pass legislation that would prevent terror convicts from running for the Knesset over concerns that it would impact far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, Israel’s Kan public broadcaster reports.

in 2008, Ben Gvir was convicted by the Jerusalem District Court of incitement to racism and supporting a terror organisation.

Kan says that Likud MK Nissim Vaturi proposed the legislation on Sunday, which aims at preventing anyone who has ever been involved in terrorist activity from running from a Knesset seat, regardless of the severity of the crime.

Netanyahu vetoes Gallant’s planned field hospital for Gaza kids

The Times of Israel reports: A public fight broke out between Yoav Gallant and Benjamin Netanyahu Thursday over the medical treatment of Gaza children.

Gallant announced on Wednesday that a field hospital for children would be established by the IDF in Israel, near the Gaza border, due to the extended closure of Gaza’s Rafah Crossing into Egypt, which Gazans had previously used in order to travel overseas for medical treatment.

But Gallant’s announcement was apparently not coordinated with the prime minister. Netanyahu’s office reportedly informed Gallant that he would not approve the establishment of the field hospital “and for this reason it will not be established.”

ICC to issue arrest warrants for Israeli leaders Netanyahu, Gallant ‘within two weeks’

The New Arab reports: The International Criminal Court (ICC) is expected to issue arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant within the next two weeks, Israeli media reported on Wednesday.

A report by Israel’s Channel 14 cited unnamed Israeli officials who said they believed that it was “highly probable” that the arrest warrants would be issued in that time frame.

This comes weeks after Netanyahu said in June that he expected the warrants to be issued before his address to the US Congress on 24 July, according to Ynet.

ICC chief prosecutor Karim Khan applied for warrants against the two Israeli leaders on 20 May for the war crimes of using starvation as a weapon of war and wilful killing, among other charges.

Ukraine makes humanitarian flour shipment to Palestinians

The New Arab reports: Ukraine said Thursday that it had sent flour to the Palestinian territories as part of an initiative to ship free agricultural supplies to poor countries and regions.

“Palestine received 1,000 tons of wheat flour,” Ukraine’s foreign ministry posted on X.

“The shipment is the first of three deliveries intended for Palestine… It will support over 101,000 Palestinian families for a month,” it said.

Kyiv launched the “Grain for Ukraine” initiative in a bid to ensure Russia’s invasion did not threaten its position as one of the world’s largest agricultural exporters.

Ukraine did not say whether the flour was intended for Gaza, which is facing a humanitarian crisis and steep drops in the amount of aid that has reached the coastal strip during the war between Israel and Hamas.

Kyiv was a major grain exporter to the Palestinians before Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.

US declares ‘mission complete’ for Gaza Aid Pier after delivering one day’s worth of food

The Cradle reports: The Pentagon announced on 17 July that the floating pier built off the coast of Gaza would be dismantled for good, declaring its “mission complete” two months after it started operations.

“Our assessment is that the temporary pier has achieved its intended effect to surge a very high volume of aid into Gaza and ensure that aid reaches the civilians in Gaza in a quick manner,” Cooper said, adding that nearly 20 million pounds of aid entered Gaza via the pier – the equivalent of about 600 truckloads.

For months, the UN and other human rights organizations have established that a minimum of 500 to 600 truckloads of aid need to enter Gaza daily to alleviate critical famine conditions. A large part of the aid that reached Gaza via the pier rotted under the sun for weeks after the US and Israel used the alleged humanitarian corridor to launch a bloody rescue operation in Nuseirat camp that killed nearly 300 Palestinians.

Cooper also announced that efforts to deliver aid to Gaza by sea would shift to the Israeli port of Ashdod. He added that, after US troops failed to re-attach the pier last week for a final time, about five million pounds of aid stranded in Cyprus and at sea will be heading to Ashdod.

“Having now delivered the largest volume of humanitarian assistance ever into the Middle East, we’re now mission complete and transitioning to a new phase,” Cooper claimed. “In the coming weeks, we expect that millions of pounds of aid will enter into Gaza via this new pathway.”

RECOMMENDED READING: What would you do with an extra $320 million?



US elections 2024: Democratic Party platform backs Biden’s approach to Gaza, Middle East policy

Middle East Eye reports: There will be very little change to President Joe Biden’s widely unpopular approach to Israel’s war on Gaza if he is reelected, a leaked draft of the Democratic Party’s platform for 2024 has revealed, indicating the party’s refusal to envisage any new headway in ending a war that has killed close to 40,000 Palestinians in 10 months.

The 80-page platform, released by Politico and which will be endorsed next month during the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, includes a two-page section on the Middle East, in which it categorically condemns the Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel that took place on 7 October and reiterates that “the United States wants to see Hamas defeated”.

The platform lists examples of Biden’s unwavering support for Israel’s war on Gaza, including the sending of arms shipments and providing a diplomatic shield for Israel at the United Nations during votes for a ceasefire and regarding concerns about human rights violations.

(Read the full article here.)

Speaker Mike Johnson Threatens to Arrest Lawmakers Who Disrupt Netanyahu’s Congress speech

Ha’aretz reports: At the Republican Jewish Coalition’s “Salute to Pro-Israel Elected Officials” on the sidelines of the GOP convention, the only thing more palpable than leading officials’ support for Israel is their resentment toward Joe Biden and the Democratic Party.

The event, attended by hundreds and including addresses from among the most senior Republican officials in America, was the convention’s clearest and firmest argument from the GOP that it is “the only-pro Israel party” amid the Democratic Party’s leftward shift amid the Gaza war. [EDITOR’S NOTE: The Democratic Party is also pro-Israel – see above article – but has made a few concessions to its constituents during the current war.]

“We have been demonstrating that over and over and over,” House Speaker Mike Johnson said, noting the Republican efforts to attack the Biden administration over the delay of a shipment of 2,000 pound heavy-payload weapons. [Read about the effects of heavy bombs here.]

“This is a moment for moral clarity and it’s unconscionable to us that the president and some leaders in Congress are unable to say what is good and what is evil,” he continued, addressing the pro-Palestinian protest movement on college campuses. [Read the truth about campus protests here.]

He additionally forecasted future legislative action aimed at college endowments and protesters in America on student visas.

Johnson further attacked Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer for delaying the invitation to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress.

“The only reason this got done is because I went to the press corps,” he said, vowing that Capitol Police will arrest anyone who tries to disrupt Netanyahu’s speech.

Former President Donald Trump spoke during the Republican National Convention saying: “We want our hostages back,” adding: “They better be back before I assume office or you will be paying a very big price.”

Trump commented in his speech on Israel’s Iron Dome system, highlighting its part in intercepting a drone and missile attack from Iran in April.

NOTE: Many conservative analysts disagree with this Israel-first position:



US teachers’ union pushes for Israel divestment

Members of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), one of the largest US unions, have put forth a resolution to divest from Israel bonds.

“The AFT holds only one bond of a foreign government, … a country internationally accused of committing war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide,” they wrote in a statement.

The AFT’s Israel bond, “which helps fund Israel’s scholasticide and genocide, and pays for Israel’s longstanding occupation of the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the apartheid regime against Palestinians everywhere”, is valued at $150,000.

Groups Condemn Microsoft’s Unjust Blocking of Palestinian Skype and Email Accounts

Al Haq, a Palestinian human rights organization, reports: The Palestinian Digital Rights Coalition and other groups released a statement Thursday condemning discriminatory actions by Microsoft against Palestinian users:

The Palestinian Digital Rights Coalition and undersigned allies strongly condemn Microsoft’s recent treatment of Palestinian customers. The company’s recent actions of blocking Palestinian users’ email and Skype accounts, an unjust disruption that has severe consequences on their daily lives during a time of war, is not only an affront to basic human decency but also a violation of their fundamental rights.

Access to technology and communication is crucial, especially in conflict zones where information and connectivity can mean the difference between life and death. Furthermore, Microsoft accounts provide access to communication platforms, bank accounts, and job opportunities.

By blocking its services, Microsoft is effectively cutting Palestinians off from social, professional, and financial opportunities during a time of immense suffering and devastation. Microsoft’s decision to restrict its services to Palestinians at such a critical juncture is deeply troubling and cannot be justified.

(Read the full statement here.)

Houthis suggest Gaza aid deal with Israel for decrease in attacks on shipping

Al Jazeera reports: A senior Houthi official in Yemen says if Israel allows desperately needed humanitarian aid into northern Gaza, the militia will cease some attacks on ships that visit the Umm al-Rashrash port, known in Israel as Eilat.

Mohammed Ali al-Houthi said on X: “We say to the enemy if you allow the entry of aid into the north of Gaza, as much as you allow the Yemeni Mujahideen army will allow the delivery of similar quantities to the occupied port. The ball is in your court.”

Al-Houthi suggested Egyptian and Qatari mediators could work out such a deal with Israel in consultation with Palestinian armed groups.

The Houthis have for months targeted Israel-linked cargo vessels with missile and drone strikes in support of Palestinians, promising to continue the attacks until Israel ends it war on Gaza.

MORE NEWS:

IMEMC Daily Reports.

Counterpunch: Israel Seeks to Redraw the Laws of War

Al Jazeera: Israel keeps bombing Gaza schools. Why do people still shelter there?

Al Jazeera: ‘Reprehensible’: UN slams Israeli spokesman’s comments on UNRWA chief

Mondoweiss: Here’s how a collective of tech professionals shut down the Israeli army’s extortion website — twice


STATISTICS OCTOBER 7 – JULY 18:

Palestinian death toll from October 7 – July 18: at least 39,424* (38,848 in Gaza* – 11,445 women (30%), 16,034 children as of June 17. [The Ministry’s figures have been contested by the Israeli authorities, although they have been accepted as accurate by Israeli intelligence services, the UN, and WHO. These data are supported by independent analyses, comparing changes in the number of deaths of UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) staff with those reported by the Ministry, which found claims of data fabrication implausible.]

This is expected to be a significant undercount since thousands of those killed have yet to be identified – and at least 576 in the West Bank (~140 children). This does not include an estimated 10,000 more still buried under rubble (4,900 women and children). Euro-Med Monitor reports 46,848 Palestinian deaths.

Lancet: “Applying a conservative estimate of four indirect deaths per one direct death9 to the 37,396 deaths reported, it is not implausible to estimate that up to 186 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza.

Ralph Nader earlier estimated 200,000 Palestinians may have been killed in Gaza.

At least 46 Palestinians have died in Israeli prisons (27 from Gaza, 18 from West Bank).
At least 40 Palestinians have died due to malnutrition**.
About 1.7 million, or 75% of Gaza’s population are currently displaced.
2.15 million (out of total population of 2.3 million) are projected to face Crisis or worse levels of food insecurity.
Palestinian injuries from October 7 – July 18: at least 94,879 (including at least 89,459 in Gaza and 5,420 in the West Bank, including 830 children).

[It remains unknown how many Americans are among the casualties in Gaza.]
Reported Israeli death toll from October 7 – July 18: ~1,481 (~1,139 on October 7, 2023, of which ~32 were Americans, and ~36 were children); 326 military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza; 16 in the West Bank) and~8,730 injured.

Times of Israel reports: The IDF listed 41 soldiers killed due to friendly fire in Gaza and other military-related accidents – nearly 16%.

NOTE: It is unknown at this time how many of the deaths and injuries in Israel on October 7 were caused by Israeli soldiers.

*Previously, IAK did not include 471 Gazans killed in the Al Ahli hospital blast since the source of the projectile was being disputed. However, given that much evidence points to Israel as the culprit, Israel had previously bombed the hospital and has attacked many others, Israel is prohibiting outside experts from investigating the scene, and since the UN and other agencies are including the deaths from the attack in their cumulative totals, if Americans knew is now also doing so.**

Euro-Med Monitor reports that Gaza’s elderly are dying at an alarmingly high rate. The majority die at home and are buried either close to their residences or in makeshift graves dispersed across the Strip. There are currently more than 140 such cemeteries. Additionally, according to Euromed, thousands have died from starvation, malnourishment, and inadequate medical care; these are considered indirect victims as they were not registered in hospitals.

† For most of the conflict, women and children accounted for about 70% of deaths in Gaza, with children making up a little over 40% of those killed, according to official statistics.

Find previous daily casualty figures and daily news updates here.

Hover over each bar for exact numbers.
Source: IsraelPalestineTimeline.org
Russia attacks hospitals in Ukraine; Israel does the same in Gaza. The US response couldn’t be more different.
‘I have the prison inside me’: The emaciated Palestinian bodybuilder broken by Israel
Israel has manufactured an industrial-scale version of Jim Crow rape hoaxes
If Americans Knew Mobile Billboard Truck at Republican Convention
Col. Douglas MacGregor: US is under the control of Israel, likens Gaza to Warsaw Ghetto
Israel’s leading paper says its own army deliberately killed Israelis on October 7
Gaza has turned into Biden’s most perplexing moral and foreign policy failure
‘Suffering horrifically’: 10 months of Israel’s ‘war on children’ in Gaza
Pro-Israel ADL ‘spied on’ African American activist over opposition to US-Israel police exchange programme
‘I’m bored, so I shoot’: The Israeli army’s approval of free-for-all violence in Gaza
Lancet: Counting the dead in Gaza – difficult but essential
‘Revealer of Inconvenient Truths’ – Julian Assange’s Impact on Palestine
Fact or Fiction: Is Israel Unfairly Singled Out for Global Condemnation?
How an Israeli colonel invented the burned babies lie to justify genocide
Widely reported Palestinian father-son ‘rape’ confession contradicted by piles of evidence
The Gaza Project reveals how Israel has targeted the press – in 3 stories
‘Buying Our Own Stolen Water’ in Bethlehem – Scorching Summer Awaits Palestinians in the West Bank
Israel’s covert info bots targeting America met with hypocritical silence
AIPAC: Has the pro-Israel lobby bribed and bought the US Democratic Party?
Israel’s war on Gaza is the deadliest conflict on record for journalists.
Israeli army hits Gaza family, uses them as human shields, and runs over their mother.
Strangling Israeli restrictions were in place long before October 7th.
The day Israeli tanks fired directly at AFP’s Gaza Bureau.
The craziest ‘pro-Israel’ votes on the Hill today.
Israeli documents show expansive government effort to shape US discourse around Gaza war.
Why As A Christian, I Won’t Be Condemning Hamas Anytime Soon.
Is “Israel Has a Right to Defend Itself” Code for “We Are Killing the Geneva Conventions”?
‘I heard all of my friends’ last breath’: Testimonies from the Nuseirat massacre.
Rep. Thomas Massie: Every congressperson has an AIPAC babysitter.
(VIDEO) Col. Douglas Macgregor: US seen as taking orders from Netanyahu.
UN finds at least 14 Israelis likely intentionally killed by own army on October 7.
ADL faces Wikipedia ban over reliability concerns on Israel, antisemitism.
Fear, hunger and displacement follows Israel’s worsening abuse of Palestinians in Hebron.
Rafah Attack: Netanyahu’s Lies Expose The Truth About Israel.
Veterans For Peace: U.S. Army Major Quits Over Israel.


https://israelpalestinenews.org/new-worries-as-polio-virus-detected-in-gaza-sewage-day-285/

How To Tell If Someone Is Controlled Opposition
Every day in my article comments and social media I get people warning me that this or that journalist, activist or politician is “controlled opposition”, meaning someone who pretends to oppose the establishment while covertly serving it. These warnings usually come after I’ve shared or written about something a dissident figure has said or done, and are usually accompanied by an admonishment not to ever do so again lest I spread their malign influence. If you’ve been involved in any kind of anti-establishment activism for any length of time, you’ve probably encountered this yourself.

Paranoia pervades dissident circles of all sorts, and it’s not entirely without merit, since establishment infiltration of political movements is the norm, not the exception. This article by Truthout documents multiple instances in which movements like the 1968 Chicago DNC protest and Peter Camejo’s 1976 anti-establishment presidential campaign were so heavily infiltrated by opaque government agencies that one out of every six people involved in them were secretly working for the feds. This trend of infiltration is known to have continued into the current day with movements like Occupy and Black Lives Matter, and we’d be ignorant not to assume that this has been at least as rampant in online circles where people organize and disseminate ideas and information.

So it’s understandable that people are extremely vigilant about prominent figures in dissident circles, and it’s understandable that people feel paranoid. Over and over again we see shining anti-establishment movements fizzle or rendered impotent, often seemingly with the help of people we once trusted, and it’s hard not to get frustrated and become suspicious of anyone who starts shining bright in antiwar, leftist, or other dissident circles.

The trouble with this paranoia and suspicion is that it doesn’t seem to function with any kind of intelligence. I have received such “controlled opposition” warnings about pretty much every prominent dissident figure in the English-speaking world at one time or another, and if I believed them all there’d be no one in the world whose words I could share or write about, including my own. I myself have been accused at different times of being a “plant” for the CIA, the Russians, Assad, the Chinese Communist Party, the Iranian mullahs, the alt-right, Trump, Pyongyang, and the Palestinians, which if all true would make me a very busy girl indeed. Since I know I’m not a plant for anybody, I know for myself that such accusations don’t come from a place of insight with any degree of reliability, and I’ve therefore had to find my own way to navigate this confusing landscape.

So since I know that infiltration and manipulation happens, but I don’t find other people’s whisperings about “controlled opposition” useful, how do I figure out who’s trustworthy and who isn’t? How do I figure out who it’s safe to cite in my work and who to avoid? How do I separate the fool’s gold from the genuine article? The shit from the Shinola?

Here is my answer: I don’t.

I spend no mental energy whatsoever concerning myself with who may or may not be a secret pro-establishment influencer, and for good reason. There’s no way to know for sure if an individual is secretly scheming to sheep dog the populace into support for the status quo, and as long as government agencies remain opaque and unaccountable there will never be a way to know who might be secretly working for them. What I can know is (A) what I’ve learned about the world, (B) the ways the political/media class is lying about what I know about the world, and (C) when someone says something which highlights those lies. I therefore pay attention solely to the message, and no attention to what may or may not be the hidden underlying agenda of the messenger.

In other words, if someone says something which disrupts establishment narratives, I help elevate what they’re saying in that specific instance. I do this not because I know that the speaker is legit and uncorrupted, but because their message in that moment is worthy of elevation. You can navigate the entire political/media landscape in this way.

Since society is made of narrative and power ultimately rests in the hands of those who are able to control those narratives, it makes no sense to fixate on individuals and it makes perfect sense to focus on narrative. What narratives are being pushed by those in power? How are those narratives being disrupted, undermined and debunked by things that are being said by dissident voices? This is the most effective lens through which to view the battle against the unelected power establishment which is crushing us all to death, not some childish fixation on who should or shouldn’t be our hero.

Have no heroes. Trust nobody but your own inner sense-maker. If someone says something that disrupts establishment narratives based on what you understand those narratives to be, go ahead and help throw what they’re saying into the gears of the machine. Don’t make a religion out of it, don’t get attached to it, just use it as a weapon to attack the narrative matrix.

This by the way is also a useful lens to look through in spiritual development, if you’re into that sort of thing. When you enter spiritual circles concerned with enlightenment, you’ll see all sorts of debates about what teachers are really enlightened and which ones are just pretending, and these conversations mimic precisely the exact kinds of debates you’ll see in marginalized political circles about who’s the real deal and who’s controlled opposition. But the truth is there’s no way to know with certainty what’s going on in someone else’s head, and the best thing to do is to stop concerning yourself with who has and has not attained some special realization or whatever and just focus on what they’re saying. If a spiritual teacher says something which helps you notice something you’d never noticed before about consciousness or perception, then use what they said and maybe stick around to see if they have anything else useful to say. If not, move on.

There’s no reason to worry about what journalists, activists and politicians are coming from a place of authenticity if you know yourself to be coming from a place of authenticity. As you learn more about the world and get better at distinguishing fact from narrative, you will get better and better at seeing the narrative matrix clearly, and you’ll come to see all the things that are being said about what’s going on in the world as weapons in the battle of narrative control. Pick up whatever weapons seem useful to you and use them in whatever ways they’ll be useful, without wasting energy concerning yourself with the individuals who created them. Call the bullshit what it is and use the truth for what it is.

Or maybe I’m fulla shit! Maybe I myself am being paid to say these things by some powerful influencer; you can’t know for sure. All you can know is what’s useful for you. If you really find it useful to try and organize individual dissident figures into “hero” and “controlled opposition” boxes, if that genuinely helps you take apart the system that’s hurting us all, you’d know that better than I would. But if you find what I’m saying here useful, pick it up and add it to your toolbox.

______________________

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https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2019/02/11/how-to-tell-if-someone-is-controlled-opposition/

Maxwell Yearick Was Under FBI Radar Before He Shot Trump
admin
Who is Maxwell Yearick
Maxwell Yearick, 30, of Perry South, who pleaded guilty in connection with a police altercation during an anti-Trump protest almost a year ago, had been sentenced to three to 12 months in the Allegheny County Jail.

Maxwell Yearick is the shooter who shot Trump. Former President Donald Trump was injured in a shooting incident at his campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on Saturday, July 13, 2024.

Donald Trump Shooter
Many months ago, Maxwell Yearick was reportedly involved in a violent Antifa protest in Seattle, that involved by clashes with law enforcement and property damage. He reportedly organised 500 protestors to the event.

As a result of the his actions, Pittsburgh Police Detective Sourouth Chatterji suffered minor injuries and Pittsburgh Police Detective Michele Auge suffered a torn bicep resulting in surgery and six months off of work

Maxwell Yearick Dead Body
Who is Maxwell Yearick?

Suspect Identified Maxwell Yearick
Age 30 Years
Height 5′ 11′ (185 m)
Weapon Remington 700
Voted For Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden
ilhan omar worth
Ilhan Omar is a Rich Somalian with $16 Million Wealth


Maxwell Yearick Trump Shooter
Troubles with Law Enforcement

When he was 17 years old, Maxwell Yearick’s woes began with a burglary at a convenience store, where surveillance footage allegedly showed him stealing cash and merchandise.

Pittsburgh, PA (Police Brutality Protest): Yearick joined a rally condemning police brutality, advocating for systemic reforms. He assaulted a police officer and a elderly women who had MAGA sticker on her car.

Washington, D.C. (Anti-Trump March): During a large-scale protest against then-President Donald Trump, Yearick voiced opposition to administration policies.

Portland, OR (Civil Rights Demonstration): Yearick participated in a march advocating for civil rights, amidst escalating tensions with counter-protesters.

Seattle, WA (Anti-Racism Rally): At a rally against racial injustice, Yearick’s presence underscored solidarity with marginalized communities. However, reports say he tried to sexually assault a girl wearing red shirt.

Minneapolis, MN (George Floyd Protests): Yearick joined demonstrations demanding justice for George Floyd, amid incidents of property damage by rioters.

Chicago, IL (Anti-ICE Protest): Yearick protested against ICE policies, reflecting widespread concerns over immigration enforcement.

New York City, NY (Environmental Activism): Engaging in environmental activism, Yearick highlighted climate change issues during a peaceful protest.

Los Angeles, CA (Women’s Rights March): Yearick supported women’s rights at a march advocating for gender equality and reproductive rights. This is time when he threatened Trump.

Atlanta, GA (Voting Rights Demonstration): Maxwell Yearick participated in a protest emphasizing voting rights and access to democratic processes.

Boston, MA (Anti-White Supremacy Rally): Yearick attended a rally denouncing white supremacy, amidst clashes leading to property damage and arrests.

IMPORTANT NOTICE: THE CONTENT IN THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN SOURCED FROM VARIOUS SOCIAL MEDIA ACCOUNTS AND INFORMATION SUBMITTED BY ANONYMOUS SOURCES. WE ARE NOT LIABLE FOR ANY INACCURACIES.


https://www.caclubindia.com/assets/maxwell-yearick/